1 [U] ~ (to sb/sth) the act of strongly disagreeing with sb/sth, especially with the aim of preventing sth from happening:
Delegates expressed strong opposition to the plans. * The army met with fierce opposition in every town. * We cannot back down at the first sign of opposition. * He spent five years in prison for his opposition to the regime. * opposition forces (= people who are arguing, fighting, etc. with another group)
2 (the opposition) [sing.+sing./pl.v.] the people you are competing against in business, a competition, a game, etc:
He's gone to work for the opposition. * The opposition is / are mounting a strong challenge to our business. * Liverpool couldn't match the opposition in the final and lost 20.
3 (the Opposition) [sing.+sing./pl.v.] the main political party that is opposed to the government; the political parties that are in a parliament but are not part of the government:
the leader of the Opposition * Opposition MPs / parties * the Opposition spokesman on education
4 [U,C] (formal) the state of being as different as possible; two things that are as different as possible:
the opposition between good and evil * His poetry is full of oppositions and contrasts.
oppositional adjective [usuallybeforenoun] (formal):
oppositional groups / tactics
IDIOMS
in opposition (of a political party) forming part of a parliament but not part of the government:
They returned to power after six years in opposition.
in opposition to sb/sth
1 disagreeing strongly with sb/sth, especially with the aim of preventing sth from happening:
We found ourselves in opposition to several colleagues on this issue. * Protest marches were held in opposition to the proposed law.
2 contrasting two people or things that are very different:
Leisure is often defined in opposition to work.
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About this entry
This is a English–English dictionary entry.
Sourced from Main Dictionary in Lughet's collection.
This word also appears under other sources in Lughet's collection — see the list below.
Where does this definition of opposition come from?
This entry for opposition is sourced from Main Dictionary, one of the dictionaries and corpora merged into Lughet.
Is opposition a noun, verb, or something else?
In this entry, opposition is tagged as noun.
Does opposition appear elsewhere on Lughet?
Yes — opposition appears under other sources or language pairs in Lughet's collection. See the list below.
What is Lughet?
Lughet is a free trilingual dictionary covering nearly five million entries across Uyghur, Chinese, and English, drawn from more than ten source dictionaries and corpora.
