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divide and conquer

proverb, verb, noun — 5 senses

divide and conquer

proverb

Etymology Calque of Latin dīvide et imperā.

1

In order to rule securely, do not allow alliances between your enemies.

divide and conquer

verb

Etymology Calque of Latin dīvide et imperā.

1

To use a combination of political, military and economic strategies that aim to gain and maintain power by breaking up larger concentrations of power into chunks that individually have less power than the one implementing the strategy.

  • It added that it can't begin pay talks without permission from Transport Scotland, and then cited a TSSA union survey of ScotRail that suggested that most of its members were against strikes, instead preferring job security rather than a pay rise. This prompted the TSSA to accuse ScotRail of trying to divide and conquer.2020 December 2, Philip Haigh, “A winter of discontent caused by threat of union action”, in Rail, page 62:

divide and conquer

noun

Etymology Calque of Latin dīvide et imperā.

1

A strategy for achieving political or military control.

2

Computer, Computing, Engineering, Mathematics, Natural sciences, Physical sciences, Science, Sciences An algorithm design technique that solves a problem by splitting it recursively into smaller problems until all of the remaining problems are trivial.

  • The quicksort algorithm is an example of divide and conquer.
3

A phacoemulsification technique in which the nucleus is grooved and divided into halves.

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — list of authors.