Word.ws English Dictionary

contractualism

contractualism noun: a political theory based on the idea of a social contract between a ruler and their subjects.

Noun

contractualism (uncountable)

  1. A political theory based on the idea of a social contract between a ruler and their subjects.
    • the customary part of the ceremony in which the monarch was presented before the people in his regalia for popular acclaim was removed altogether for fear that it be interpreted as incipient contractualism.2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin, published 2003, page 301

Origin of contractualism

From contractual + -ism.

Questions about contractualism

What does contractualism mean?
Contractualism means a political theory based on the idea of a social contract between a ruler and their subjects.
What part of speech is contractualism?
Contractualism is a noun.

Words near contractualism in the dictionary

  1. contractualisation
  2. contractualise
  3. contractualised
  4. contractualises
  5. contractualising
  6. contractualism
  7. contractualist
  8. contractualistic
  9. contractualists
  10. contractualization
  11. contractualize

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: contractualism (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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