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Complicity vs Complacency - What's the difference?

complicity | complacency |

As nouns the difference between complicity and complacency

is that complicity is (The state of being complicit)The state of being complicit; involvement as a partner or accomplice, especially in a crime or other wrongdoing while complacency is a feeling of contented self-satisfaction, especially when unaware of upcoming trouble.

complicity

Noun

(complicities)
  • (senseid)The state of being complicit; involvement as a partner or accomplice, especially in a crime or other wrongdoing.
  • * 1854 , , Hard Times , ch. 32:
  • He drew up a placard, offering Twenty Pounds reward for the apprehension of Stephen Blackpool, suspected of complicity in the robbery of Coketown Bank.
  • (archaic) Complexity.Oxford English Dictionary , 2nd ed., 1989.
  • * 1861 , Dr. Marx, "Musical Education and Instruction," The Musical Times , vol. 10, no. 220, p. 53:
  • How easy is it, on the other hand, to an enlightened teacher, particularly in the beginning, to elucidate the various forms of rhythm by methodical arrangement in respect of simplicity and increasing complicity or mixture!

    Synonyms

    * collusion, complicitousness, connivance

    Derived terms

    * complicitous

    References

    complacency

    English

    Alternative forms

    * complacence

    Noun

    (complacencies)
  • A feeling of contented self-satisfaction, especially when unaware of upcoming trouble.
  • *
  • There was something pathetic in his concentration as if his complacency , more acute than of old, was not enough to him any more. When, almost immediately, the telephone rang inside and the butler left the porch Daisy seized upon the momentary interruption and leaned toward me.
  • * Addison
  • Others proclaim the infirmities of a great man with satisfaction and complacency , if they discover none of the like in themselves.
  • An instance of self-satisfaction.