foot-dragging

From foot +‎ dragging, from drag one’s feet, referring to the idea of walking while dragging one’s feet along the ground, either from lack of enthusiasm or to intentionally slow down movement.

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ˈfʊtˌdɹæɡɪŋ/

• Audio (Southern England):

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foot-dragging (usually uncountable, plural foot-draggings)

1. (also attributive) The deliberate delaying of, or reluctance to take, obligatory action.

   Synonyms: slowball, slow-walking

   • 1918 April, Francis Lynde, Branded, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, →OCLC, page 114:

     I am glad to be able to say that common honesty, or some shadowy simulacrum of it, revived presently and sent me back to the hotel, though not without terrible foot-draggings, you may be sure.

   • 2005, Clive Archer, “Change, Choice and Conclusions”, in Norway outside the European Union: Norway and European Integration from 1994 to 2004 (Europe and the Nation State), Abingdon, Oxfordshire; New York, N.Y.: Routledge, →ISBN, page 191:

     The tactics of pace-setting, foot-dragging, least resistance or fence-sitting could be used either in the making of policy or, later, in its implementation, reflecting types of adaptation […].

   • 2008, Maryann Dickar, “‘You Have to Change Your Whole Attitude toward Everything’: Threshold Struggles and Infrapolitical Resistance”, in Corridor Cultures: Mapping Student Resistance at an Urban School (Qualitative Studies in Psychology), New York, N.Y.; London: New York University Press, →ISBN, page 154:

     Once in the classroom, students also employed foot-dragging strategies to slow the transition from the hall state to the student state.

   • 2010 December 9, Ewen MacAskill, “WikiLeaks cables: China ‘fed up’ with Burma's footdragging on reforms”, in Alan Rusbridger, editor, The Guardian‎^[1], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 17 May 2023:

     A Beijing diplomat complained China is "fed up with the footdragging" of Burma's strongman, General Than Shwe, and his inner circle, one of the cables, released by WikiLeaks, reported.

   • 2021 March 24, “Open Access: Waiting for the wires”, in Rail, number 927, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire: Bauer Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 33:

     Given that (English) politicians are noted for foot-dragging on electrification schemes, will they use these new locomotives simply as an excuse to defer more electrification schemes?

• footdragging

• delaying tactic

• delaying tactic on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• “foot-dragging, n. and adj.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, December 2024.
• “foot-dragging, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.