Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
with an eye towards

with an eye towards

1 5.2
To plan or act while thinking about a future goal
  • idiom
  • UK
translation icon : con miras a
  • She saved money all year with an eye towards buying her first home.

You cast for them with the with an eye towards conflict.

Examples

  • HI is a hub connecting you to the city's past in the present, with an eye towards the future.

    Blog text (31)

  • "Everything in the vehicle, every single component from the ground up, is actually designed with an eye towards its contribution to survivability," Bryant told AOL Defense.

    Blog text (33)

  • We used to farm with an eye towards the long term.

  • We want to know what it thinks too, with an eye towards pulling apart what a statistical learning machine would do and what a person would do.

  • In all probability, this move was crafted by Bill and Hillary with an eye towards 2016.

    Blog text (5)

  • If the goal of the 2016 law was to increase use tax awareness, with an eye towards self-reporting, the 2016 measures certainly seem more likely to make Oklahoma residents aware of their use tax obligations.

    Academic text (2017)

  • The jubilee is a nice symbolic effort, but it is much better to challenge the legitimacy of the system with an eye towards some serious reform.

    Blog text (6)

  • Agencies crafted their pre-APA, self-generated rules of procedure, for instance, with an eye towards the public's view of their fairness.

    Academic text (2018)

  • This is a continuation of Pakistan's slow and careful turn towards reaching out diplomatically to some of its traditional enemies in Afghanistan with an eye towards negotiations.

    Blog text (25)

  • The city council implemented new policies with an eye towards improving air quality.

Synonyms

with a view to
vswith an eye towards
  • Formal
3.5

To do something in order to make something happen

focuses on planning future actions toward that result

Antonyms

haphazardly
9 6.1

In a way that is not planned or organized

planless
1 7.2

Having no plan or clear aim

How Intentional

with an eye towards
  • UK
1 5.2
purposefully
31 3.9
expressly
33 4.4
by chance
66 2.3

Surface Forms

with an eye towards main

Morphology

with + an + eye + toward

The phrase uses 'eye' metaphorically to mean attention or regard and 'towards' signals orientation, so a learner who knows those constituents can plausibly infer a sense of 'looking/considering in the direction of' a goal. However, the construction 'with an eye (to/towards) X' is a conventional, somewhat figurative prepositional pattern whose pragmatic purpose ('for the sake of' or 'with the intention of') is not fully literal, making it partially but not fully predictable.

Etymology

With an eye towards gives the image of someone keeping one eye on a future goal while they work now. That's why it means doing or planning something now 'with a particular goal in mind'.