officialdom

From official +‎ -dom.

• enPR: ə-fĭʹ-shəl-dəm, IPA^(key): /əˈfɪ.ʃəl.dəm/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪʃəldəm

officialdom (countable and uncountable, plural officialdoms)

1. The people elected to government or employed in the civil service.
   • 1960 June 10, Walt Kelly, Pogo, comic strip, →ISBN, page 153:

     [Magazine staffer:] In the bag may be the next chief—a wedding to one of officialdom's family will assure certainty.

   • 2013, James Palmer, ‘Kept women’, Aeon:

     An enormous amount of off-book money sloshes around Chinese business and officialdom, and some of it runs into handbags.

2. (rare) The state of being official
   • 2013, Christian Ortner, Hermann Hinterstoisser, , The Austro-Hungarian Army in the First World War. Uniforms & Equipment - from 1914 to 1918:

     This was largely due to its widespread use in the army and officialdom in the Ottoman Empire.