Regulate vs Enforce - What's the difference?
regulate | enforce |
To dictate policy.
To control or direct according to rule, principle, or law.
* Macaulay
* Bancroft
To adjust to a particular specification or requirement: regulate temperature.
To adjust (a mechanism) for accurate and proper functioning.
To put or maintain in order.
(obsolete) To strengthen (a castle, town etc.) with extra troops, fortifications etc.
(obsolete) To intensify, make stronger, add force to.
(obsolete, reflexive) To exert oneself, to try hard.
*, Bk.VII:
*:I pray you enforce youreselff at that justis that ye may be beste, for my love.
To give strength or force to; to affirm, to emphasize.
:The victim was able to enforce his evidence against the alleged perpetrator.
(archaic) To compel, oblige (someone or something); to force.
*, I.2.4.iv:
*:Uladislaus the Second, King of Poland, and Peter Dunnius, Earl of Shrinehad been hunting late, and were enforced to lodge in a poor cottage.
*1899 , E. OE. Somerville and Martin Ross, Some Experiences of an Irish R.M.'', Great Uncle McCarthy :
*:In a few minutes I was stealthily groping my way down my own staircase, with a box of matches in my hand, enforced by scientific curiosity, but none the less armed with a stick.
To keep up, impose or bring into effect something, not necessarily by force.
:The police are there to enforce the law.
(obsolete) To make or gain by force; to force.
:to enforce a passage
*Spenser
*:enforcing furious way
(obsolete) To put in motion or action by violence; to drive.
*Shakespeare
*:As swift as stones / Enforced from the old Assyrian slings.
(obsolete) To give force to; to strengthen; to invigorate; to urge with energy.
:to enforce arguments or requests
*Burke
*:enforcing sentiment of the thrust humanity
(obsolete) To urge; to ply hard; to lay much stress upon.
*Shakespeare
*:Enforce him with his envy to the people.
To prove; to evince.
:(Hooker)
As verbs the difference between regulate and enforce
is that regulate is to dictate policy while enforce is to strengthen (a castle, town etc.) with extra troops, fortifications etc.regulate
English
Verb
(regulat)- the laws which regulate the successions of the seasons
- The herdsmen near the frontier adjudicated their own disputes, and regulated their own police.
- to regulate a watch, i.e. adjust its rate of running so that it will keep approximately standard time
- to regulate the temperature of a room, the pressure of steam, the speed of a machine, etc.
- to regulate the disordered state of a nation or its finances
- to regulate one's eating habits