governance

noun

gov·​er·​nance ˈgə-vər-nən(t)s 

plural governances

: the act or process of governing or overseeing the control and direction of something (such as a country or an organization) : government

a centralized system of governance

the challenges of national governance

… the governance of amateur sport in America …

—P. S. Wood

… three years before he died, [Lionel] Trilling pressed the point that the way a nation thinks determines in the end the quality of its governance.

—Benjamin DeMott

Enron, and the corporate disasters that followed, forced many companies to get serious about governance.

—Louis Lavelle

Theirs was the perennial problem of quick-witted subjects under the governance of dull-witted administrators.

—Declan Kiberd

Michael Dukakis, at the 1988 Democratic convention, said governance was about competence, not ideology. He got it half right: Competence is important to governance, but ideology is critical …

—U.S. News & World Report

Synonyms

• government
• administration
• rule
• regime

Examples of governance in a Sentence

They have very different approaches to the governance of the city.

after World War II, the four Allied nations shared the governance of the territory of postwar Germany under the Allied Control Council

Recent Examples on the Web

In this sense, genome writing is as much about governance as genetics. —Big Think, 20 Oct. 2025

For the last two years, Israel had refused to come up with a plan for post-war governance of Gaza. —Kara Fox, CNN Money, 19 Oct. 2025

Amendments made to the FIA statutes, voted through by a super majority at the 2025 FIA General Assemblies, further strengthen processes around governance and confidentiality. —Madeline Coleman, New York Times, 19 Oct. 2025

Only 42% of democracies affected by autocratization – a transformation in governance that erodes democratic safeguards – since 1994 have rebounded after a democratic breakdown, according to Swedish research institute V-Dem. —Shelley Inglis, The Conversation, 19 Oct. 2025

Word History

Etymology

see govern

First Known Use

15th century, in the meaning defined above

Phrases Containing governance

• self-governance

Kids Definition

governance

noun

gov·​er·​nance ˈgəv-ər-nən(t)s 

: the exercise of control : government