vigilance committee
1
8.4
- noun
- /ˈvɪdʒɪləns kəˈmɪti/
:
comité de vigilancia
- The vigilance committee organized regular patrols to deter crime and protect their community.
Examples
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By order of the community I've got a vigilance committee formed.
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Lynch mobs and Vigilance Committees are government—just pretty shitty government.
Blog text (32) -
The community established a vigilance committee to ensure safety as local law enforcement was ineffective.
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Residents formed a vigilance committee to monitor neighborhood activities in the absence of reliable police services.
Synonyms
1
3.6
A group of local people who work together to solve community problems
How Official
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is simply a noun + noun composition where 'vigilance' (alertness/watchfulness) qualifies 'committee' (a group), so a learner who knows both words can infer it is a group tasked with watching or being alert—likely to maintain order or monitor problems. This compositional pattern is cross-linguistically common, so while specific legal/extra-legal nuances might require context, the overall meaning is transparently derivable from the parts.
Etymology
Vigilance committee comes from the simple picture of neighbours staying awake to watch for danger—vigilance means careful watching—and then forming a small group, a committee, to act when there was no proper police. So it now means a group of local people who 'keep order' and enforce rules themselves.