power vacuum

plural power vacuums · plural power vacua

1. A lack of centralised political authority, especially following a conflict, revolution, change of power, etc.

   The assassination of Charlie Kirk also left a power vacuum on the right that has set off a scramble among its more extreme elements.

   2025 November 6, Clyde McGrady, “Nick Fuentes’s Rise Puts MAGA Movement in a ‘Time of Choosing’”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 06 Nov 2025

   4 more examples

   Fourth, knowing what I did of the policies and actions of Moscow and Peking, I was as sure as a man could be that if we did not live up to our commitment in Southeast Asia and elsewhere, they would move to exploit the disarray in the United States and in the alliances of the Free World. They might move independently or they might move together. But move they would — whether through nuclear blackmail, through subversion, with regular armed forces, or in some other manner. As nearly as one can be certain of anything, I knew they could not resist the opportunity to expand their control into the vacuum of power we would leave behind us.

   1971, Lyndon Johnson, “Challenge and Response: Vietnam 1964—1965”, in The Vantage Point, Holt, Reinhart & Winston, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 152

   A few hours before the attack, Yuval Diskin, the head of the Israeli security agency the Shin Bet, had told a parliamentary committee that there was a "power vacuum" in East Jerusalem and he also called for the demolition of the homes of people involved in terrorist attacks.

   2008 July 22, Rory McCarthy, “Middle East: Driver shot dead after injuring 16 in second Jerusalem bulldozer attack”, in The Guardian, archived from the original on 06 May 2021

   the old order had irretrievably vanished like breath off a razor blade, and there was a good old-fashioned power vacuum or, as we used to say in factional meetings, a “situation of dual power.”

   2010, Christopher Hitchens, Hitch-22, Atlantic, published 2011, page 184

   As Mr. Henry’s government’s already tenuous hold on the country has largely evaporated during the unrest, other factions have attempted to fill the power vacuum.

   2022 September 16, Milo Milfort, Anatoly Kurmanaev, Andre Paultre, “Fuel Hike Plunges Haiti Into Near Anarchy”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 14 Oct 2022