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Complicity vs Conspiracy - What's the difference?

complicity | conspiracy |

As nouns the difference between complicity and conspiracy

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 conspiracy is the act of two or more persons, called conspirators, working secretly to obtain some goal, usually understood with negative connotations.

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

    conspiracy

    Noun

    (conspiracies)
  • The act of two or more persons, called conspirators, working secretly to obtain some goal, usually understood with negative connotations.
  • (legal) An agreement between two or more persons to break the law at some time in the future.
  • A group of ravens.
  • (linguistics) A situation in which different phonological or grammatical rules lead to similar or related outcomes.
  • Derived terms

    * conspiracy of silence * conspiracy theory