Definition of "ochlocracy" [och•loc•ra•cy]

• Government by the masses; mob rule. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "a democracy that departed from the civil and political equality which was its supposed basis, and gave ascendancy to a faction, was sometimes designated by the term ochlocracy, or the dominion of the rabble."
• "The latter is rightly called "ochlocracy" -- mob rule."
• "If we lived in a mobocracy (also known as ochlocracy) we would vote and the majority would rule on every little issue."