Word.ws English Dictionary

declinism

UK/dɪˈklaɪnɪzəm/

declinism noun: a pessimistic belief that things are in decline.

Noun

declinism (uncountable)

  1. A pessimistic belief that things are in decline.
    • Scholars point out that strains of declinism can be found in most eras of history, which raises the question, is it logically possible for the world to be going to hell interminably — to be endlessly on its way to hell, ever worse than before, and ever better at each earlier epoch?
    • Laudably, he [Cullen Murphy] ends on some optimistic notes, and some prescriptions, rather than wallowing in declinism.2007 May 13, Walter Isaacson, “The Empire in the Mirror”, in New York Times
    Antonyms:
    optimism

Examples of declinism in a sentence

  • So maybe declinism is just a quirk of human psychology.2015 January 16, Pete Etchells, “Declinism: is the world actually getting worse?”, in The Guardian:
  • Instead, declinism ruled—the belief that Britain was in a state of terminal, irreversible decline being widely shared, and—as glam has demonstrated—frequently and forcibly expressed.2018, Simon Philo, Glam Rock: Music in Sound and Vision, Rowman & Littlefield, →ISBN, page 104:
  • The chancellor came to Bloomberg’s HQ in the City of London on Friday seeking to raise the country’s spirits, hail the split with Brussels and dispel the “declinism” he says saps Britain’s energy.2023 January 27, Phillip Inman, quoting Jeremy Hunt, “Jeremy Hunt overdoes the Es: why his economic plan is a letdown”, in the Guardian:

Antonyms of declinism

Origin of declinism

From decline + -ism.

Questions about declinism

What does declinism mean?
Declinism means a pessimistic belief that things are in decline.
How do you use declinism in a sentence?
So maybe declinism is just a quirk of human psychology.
What part of speech is declinism?
Declinism is a noun.
How do you pronounce declinism?
Declinism is pronounced /dɪˈklaɪnɪzəm/ (UK).

Words near declinism in the dictionary

  1. declinest
  2. declineth
  3. declining
  4. decliningly
  5. declinings
  6. declinism
  7. declinist
  8. declinists
  9. declinometer
  10. declinometers
  11. declinous

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: declinism (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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-declinism.oga.

Cite this entry: “declinism.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/declinism. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.