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Solidarity vs Sympathy - What's the difference?

solidarity | sympathy |

As nouns the difference between solidarity and sympathy

is that solidarity is a bond of unity or agreement between individuals, united around a common goal or against a common enemy, such as the unifying principle that defines the labor movement; mutual support within a group while sympathy is a feeling of pity or sorrow for the suffering or distress of another; compassion.

As a proper noun Solidarity

is a political movement begun in the labor unions of Poland that contributed to the fall of Communism in that country.

solidarity

English

Noun

  • (countable) A bond of unity or agreement between individuals, united around a common goal or against a common enemy, such as the unifying principle that defines the labor movement; mutual support within a group.
    • A long time union member himself, Phil showed solidarity with the picketing grocery store workers by shopping at a competing, unionized store.
  • (uncountable) Willingness to give psychological and/or material support when another person is in a difficult position or needs affection.
    • Only the solidarity provided by her siblings allowed Margaret to cope with her mother's harrowing death.

    Related terms

    * solid * solidary * solidus

    External links

    * * *

    sympathy

    English

    (wikipedia sympathy)

    Noun

    (sympathies)
  • A feeling of pity or sorrow for the suffering or distress of another; compassion.
  • The ability to share the feelings of another.
  • A mutual relationship between people or things such that they are correspondingly affected by any condition.
  • * 1997 , Chris Horrocks, Introducing Foucault'', page 67, ''The Renaissance Episteme (Totem Books, Icon Books; ISBN 1840460865)
    • 'Sympathy' likened anything to anything else in universal attraction, e.g. the fate of men to the course of the planets.
  • Tendency towards or approval of the aims of a movement.

    • Usage notes

    * Used similarly to empathy, interchangeably in looser usage. In stricter usage, (term) is stronger and more intimate, while sympathy is weaker and more distant; see .

    Antonyms

    * contempt (context-dependent)

    Derived terms

    * (l) * (l) * (l), (l)