Gradation vs. Hierarchy — What's the Difference?

A series of gradual, successive stages or degrees

A hierarchy (from Greek: ἱεραρχία, hierarkhia, 'rule of a high priest', from hierarkhes, 'president of sacred rites') is an arrangement of items (objects, names, values, categories, etc.) that are represented as being "above", "below", or "at the same level as" one another. Hierarchy is an important concept in a wide variety of fields, such as philosophy, architecture, design, mathematics, computer science, organizational theory, systems theory, systematic biology, and the social sciences (especially political philosophy).

One of these stages or degrees

A group of persons or things organized into successive ranks or grades with each level subordinate to the one above

A gradual or barely perceptible change from one tone or shade, as of color, to another.

Categorization or arrangement of a group of people or things into such ranks or grades

The act of gradating or arranging in grades.

A body of persons having authority

(Linguistics) See ablaut.

A group of animals in which certain members or subgroups dominate or submit to others.

A sequence of gradual, successive stages; a systematic progression.

One of three main divisions of angels in traditional Christian angelology.

A passing by small degrees from one tone or shade, as of color, to another.

A body of authoritative officials organized in nested ranks.

The act of gradating or arranging in grades.

A social, religious, economic or political system or organization in which people or groups of people are ranked with some superior to others based on their status, authority or some other trait.

Any degree or relative position in an order or series.

Any group of objects ranked so that every one but the topmost is subordinate to a specified one above it.

(countable) A calibration marking.

Dominion or authority in sacred things.

(music) A gradual change within one parameter, or an overlapping of two blocks of sound.

A body of officials disposed organically in ranks and orders each subordinate to the one above it; a body of ecclesiastical rulers.

(music) A diatonic succession of chords.

A form of government administered in the church by patriarchs, metropolitans, archbishops, bishops, and, in an inferior degree, by priests.

(phonetics) Apophony.

A rank or order of holy beings.

(transitive) To form with gradations.

Any group of objects ranked so that every one but the topmost is subordinate to a specified one above it; also, the entire set of ordering relations between such objects. The ordering relation between each object and the one above is called a hierarchical relation.

The act of progressing by regular steps or orderly arrangement; the state of being graded or arranged in ranks; as, the gradation of castes.

A series of ordered groupings of people or things within a system;

The act or process of bringing to a certain grade.

The organization of people at different ranks in an administrative body

Any degree or relative position in an order or series.

A gradual passing from one tint to another or from a darker to a lighter shade, as in painting or drawing.

A diatonic ascending or descending succession of chords.

To form with gradations.

Relative position in a graded series;

A degree of ablaut

The act of arranging in grades