tendency

Ultimately from the Latin tendere / tendō.

• IPA^(key): /ˈtɛndənsi/

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tendency (plural tendencies)

1. A likelihood of behaving in a particular way or going in a particular direction; a tending toward.

   Denim has a tendency to fade.

2. (politics) An organised unit or faction within a larger political organisation.
   • 1974, James Boggs, Grace Lee Boggs, Revolution and Evolution, NYU Press →ISBN, page 134

     Mao launched the struggle against the vulgar materialist tendency within the party as early as 1937.

   • 1997, S. Onslow, Backbench Debate within the Conservative Party and its Influence on British Foreign Policy, 1948-57, Springer →ISBN, page 234

     In stark contrast to the Europeanist tendency within the party and the Suez Group, this group had a short history.

   • 2013, Richard Gillespie, Lourdes Lopez Nieto, Michael Waller, Factional Politics and Democratization, Routledge →ISBN, page 83

     It reinforced the position of the conformist tendency within the party, since the majority of the candidates were old politicians, many of them members of Papandreou's centre-left CU faction back in the mid-1960s.

• inclination
• disposition
• propensity
• penchant
• trend

• multitendency