Other forms: initiatives
Initiative is acting without being told to. The colleague who sees the printer is out of paper and refills it, the neighbour who clears your path when it snows, the student who starts revising before anyone mentions the exam.
In that meaning the word is uncountable: you show initiative, you have initiative, you take the initiative. Count it, and the sense shifts to a plan launched to fix something — a government initiative on housing, a recycling initiative, a peace initiative. Two fixed phrases carry the first meaning: take the initiative, which is to act first, and on your own initiative, which means nobody asked you. In chess, in war and at the negotiating table, having the initiative means you set the pace and the other side only reacts. In parts of the United States and in Switzerland, a ballot initiative is a law put to the voters by citizens' signatures instead of by parliament.
1nouninitiativeThe willingness and ability to act on your own, without waiting to be told.
“He fixed the leak on his own initiative and told nobody.”
synonyms: enterprise, drive, resourcefulness
2nounnewA new plan or effort started to deal with a problem.
“The council launched an initiative to get more bikes into schools.”
3nounadvantageThe advantage of acting first, which forces the other side to respond.
“Black gave up a pawn and held the initiative for fifteen moves.”
4nounproposedA proposed law placed before voters by citizens' signatures.
“The initiative passed with fifty-four per cent of the vote.”
The chain runs from French initiative back to Medieval Latin initiativus, 'serving to initiate', and from there to Latin initio, 'to begin'. Under all of that sits ineo, 'to enter, to begin'. The word for starting something is built on the idea of walking in — which is exactly what the person with initiative does.
Latin
initio — to begin, to initiate
Medieval Latin
*initiativus — serving to initiate
French
initiative
English, today
initiative
Built from
From French initiative, from Medieval Latin initiativus (“serving to initiate”), from Latin initio (“to begin, to initiate”), from Latin initium (“beginning”), from ineo (“enter, begin”). by surface analysis, initiate + -ive.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA