-cracy

-cracy
  (-krəsɪ)
  formerly also -cratie, -crasie, a. F. -cratie, ad. med.L. -cratia, a. Gr. -κρατία, in composition ‘power, rule’, f. κράτος strength, might, rule, authority. Already used in Greek in ἀριστοκρατία aristocracy, rule of the best-born, δηµοκρατία democracy, popular government, ὀχλοκρατία ochlocracy, mob-rule, πλουτοκρατία plutocracy, an oligarchy of wealth, θεοκρατία theocracy, rule of God; whence angelocracy, government by angels, bestiocracy (The Times 21 Nov. 1863) the rule of beasts. All these have a preceding o belonging to or representing the stem vowel of the first element, but which tends to be viewed as part of the suffix, as if this were -ocracy. The word aristocracy has in modern times, in Fr. and Eng., passed into the senses of ‘a ruling body of nobles, the nobles as a ruling class, political power, or upper class’, after which democracy has received the sense of ‘the people or lower class as a political power or element’, and plutocracy that of ‘a class ruling or influential by virtue of its wealth’.
  Hence the suffix, in the form -ocracy, has been added to English words, to designate in mockery or ridicule any dominant, superior, or aspiring class, as in the following (mostly colloquial or newspaper words); barristerocracy, brokerocracy, capocracy, millocracy, shipocracy, shoddyocracy (barristers, brokers, cap-setting women, mill-owners, ship-owners, shoddy-manufacturers, as classes of social standing or pretensions); see also beerocracy, clubocracy, cottonocracy, countyocracy, mobocracy, snobocracy, shopocracy, slaveocracy, etc.

Oxford English Dictionary