Word.ws English Dictionary

on opposite sides of the barricades

on opposite sides of the barricades prepositional phrase: holding starkly opposite views on an issue.

Prepositional phrase

  1. (idiomatic) Holding starkly opposite views on an issue.
    Synonyms:
    diametrically opposed

Synonyms of on opposite sides of the barricades

  • diametrically opposed

Origin of on opposite sides of the barricades

The idiom has been in use for at least a century http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1908/jul/23.htm https://web.archive.org/web/20060618034021/http://www.fmep.org/reports/special_reports/no10-winter2000/01-clinton_administration.html. It probably derives from a literal observation of political protests, where government buildings were insulated with barricades, and the government was said to not represent the people because they and the people were on opposite sides of the barricades.

Questions about on opposite sides of the barricades

What does on opposite sides of the barricades mean?
On opposite sides of the barricades means holding starkly opposite views on an issue.
What part of speech is on opposite sides of the barricades?
On opposite sides of the barricades is a prepositional phrase.

Words near on opposite sides of the barricades in the dictionary

  1. on one's toes
  2. on one's uppers
  3. on one's watch
  4. on one's way
  5. on ones
  6. on opposite sides of the barricades
  7. on or about
  8. on order
  9. on pain of
  10. on paper
  11. on par

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: on opposite sides of the barricades (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-on opposite sides of the barricades.ogg.

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