conscription

noun

con·​scrip·​tion kən-ˈskrip-shən 

: compulsory enrollment of persons especially for military service : draft

During the war the armed forces were heavily dependent on conscription.

Did you know?

With its scrip- root, conscription means basically writing someone's name on a list—a list that, unfortunately, a lot of people usually don't want to be on. Conscription has existed at least since ancient Egypt's Old Kingdom (27th century B.C.), though universal conscription has been rare throughout history. Forms of conscription were used by Prussia, Switzerland, Russia, and other European powers in the 17th and 18th centuries. In the U.S., conscription was first applied during the Civil War, by both the North and the South. In the North there were pockets of resistance, and the draft led to riots in several cities. The U.S. abandoned conscription at the end of the war and didn't revive it until World War I.

Examples of conscription in a Sentence

young people who face conscription into the army

Recent Examples on the Web

Each year, roughly 13,000 ultra-Orthodox men reach the conscription age of 18, but less than 10% enlist, according to parliament’s State Control Committee, which held a hearing examining the issue. —Melanie Lidman, Los Angeles Times, 12 June 2025

In South Korea, all able-bodied men aged 18 to 28 are required by law to perform 18-21 months of military service under a conscription system meant to deter aggression from rival North Korea. —Isabel Van Brugen shane Croucher, MSNBC Newsweek, 10 June 2025

Starting in 2018, as BTS soared to global stardom and topped charts, some lawmakers called for amending the conscription law to extend exemptions to outstanding pop stars. —Se Eun Gong, NPR, 10 June 2025

The conscription push is not new, and TASS reported that the rise is caused by Putin’s efforts to increase the size of Russia’s military as a whole; the country had 1 million military personnel three years ago, but now has around 1.5 million. —Anna Chernova and Rob Picheta, CNN Money, 2 Apr. 2025

Word History

Etymology

see conscript entry 1

First Known Use

1800, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for conscription

• ascription
• decryption
• description
• egyptian
• encryption
• inscription
• prescription
• proscription
• subscription
• transcription
• circumscription
• misdescription