appeasement

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   the act of calming, satisfying, or pacifying someone by meeting a demand or easing a grievance

   The mediator offered a practical concession in the hope of appeasement.

2. 2
   noun

   a policy of making political concessions to an aggressive power in order to avoid conflict

   Critics argued that appeasement would encourage the regime to make further demands.

From Middle English appesement and Old French apaisement, from apaisier, 'to bring to peace.' Its modern political sense became especially prominent in discussions of concessions made to aggressive states before the Second World War.

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