public service

1. Employment within a governmental system, especially within the civil service.

2. A service performed for the benefit of the public, especially by a nonprofit organization.

3. The business of supplying an essential commodity, such as water or electricity, or a service, such as communications or transportation, to the public.

pub′lic-ser′vice adj.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

public service

1. (Government, Politics & Diplomacy)

a. government employment

b. the management and administration of the affairs of a political unit, esp the civil service

2. (Government, Politics & Diplomacy)

a. a service provided for the community: buses provide a public service.

b. (as modifier): a public-service announcement.

3. (Government, Politics & Diplomacy) Austral and NZ the service responsible for the public administration of the government of a country. It excludes the legislative, judicial, and military branches. Members of the public service have no official political allegiance and are not generally affected by changes of governments. British equivalent: civil service

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

pub′lic serv′ice

1. the business of supplying an essential commodity, as electricity, or a service, as transportation, to the general public.

2. government employment; civil service.

3. a service to the public rendered without charge by a profit-making organization.

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Noun	1.	public service - a service that is performed for the benefit of the public or its institutions community service service - an act of help or assistance; "he did them a service"
	2.	public service - employment within a government system (especially in the civil service) employment, work - the occupation for which you are paid; "he is looking for employment"; "a lot of people are out of work" minister - the job of a head of a government department

Translations

közszolgálatiközszolgáltatás

public service

n (Civil Service) → amministrazione f pubblica

Collins Italian Dictionary 1st Edition © HarperCollins Publishers 1995

Mentioned in

References in classic literature

Two Politicians were exchanging ideas regarding the rewards for public service.

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The ordinary power of appointment is confined to the President and Senate JOINTLY, and can therefore only be exercised during the session of the Senate; but as it would have been improper to oblige this body to be continually in session for the appointment of officers and as vacancies might happen IN THEIR RECESS, which it might be necessary for the public service to fill without delay, the succeeding clause is evidently intended to authorize the President, SINGLY, to make temporary appointments "during the recess of the Senate, by granting commissions which shall expire at the end of their next session." Second.

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The father--he is called Gorshkov--is a little grey-headed tchinovnik who, seven years ago, was dismissed from public service, and now walks about in a coat so dirty and ragged that it hurts one to see it.

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In the second place, they will enter into the public service under circumstances which cannot fail to produce a temporary affection at least to their constituents.

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In vain his godfather offered to him a place in the public service, -- in vain did he try to give him a taste for glory, -- although Cornelius, to gratify his godfather, did embark with De Ruyter upon "The Seven Provinces," the flagship of a fleet of one hundred and thirty-nine sail, with which the famous admiral set out to contend singlehanded against the combined forces of France and England.

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Birth and breeding have not quite disappeared as essential qualifications in that branch of the public service. But I have decided nothing as yet.

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In consideration of this eminent public service, the Barnacle then in power had recommended the Crown to bestow a pension of two or three hundred a-year on his widow; to which the next Barnacle in power had added certain shady and sedate apartments in the Palaces at Hampton Court, where the old lady still lived, deploring the degeneracy of the times in company with several other old ladies of both sexes.

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They will, in a word, attend to those innumerable trifles that make the perfection of public service.

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'In reply to the question put by my honourable and gallant friend,' said Eugene, who was lying on his back with his hat on his face, as an attitude highly expressive of watchfulness, 'I can have no hesitation in replying (it not being inconsistent with the public service) that those accents were the accents of the T'other Governor.'

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For with deliberate self-sacrifice he now turned from poetry to prose essays, because he felt that through the latter medium he could render what seemed to him a more necessary public service. With characteristic self-confidence, and obeying his inherited tendency to didacticism, he appointed himself, in effect, a critic of English national life, beliefs, and taste, and set out to instruct the public in matters of literature, social relations, politics and religion.

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The present was not the right time for attempting that feat, not the right time for many reasons, personal and of public service. This being the strong feeling of Inspector Heat, it appeared to him just and proper that this affair should be shunted off its obscure and inconvenient track, leading goodness knows where, into a quiet (and lawful) siding called Michaelis.

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But, if Homer never did any public service, was he privately a guide or teacher of any?

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