Noun
The act of asserting one's self, or one's own rights or claims; the quality of being self-asserting.
Source: Webster's dictionaryWe are watching the beginnings of the defiant self-assertion of a new generation of Americans, a generation who are looking forward to finishing their education with no jobs, no future, but still saddled with enormous and unforgivable debt. David Graeber
This will to live was the first thing that Judaism gave to Christianity: hence that contradiction, which even today seems to many an inexplicable riddle, between a doctrine of inner conversion, toleration and mercifulness, and a religion of exclusive self-assertion and fanatical intolerance. Houston Stewart Chamberlain
The Beast stands for strong mutually antagonistic governments everywhere," he said. "Self-sufficiency at home, self-assertion abroad. Evelyn Waugh
No doubt Western civilization has in the past been full of wars and revolutions, and the national elements in our culture, even when they were ignored, always provided an unconscious driving force of passion and aggressive self-assertion. Christopher Dawson
A successful social technique consists perhaps in finding unobjectionable means for individual self-assertion. Eric Hoffer
Quite often social contrariness and a generally pessimistic outlook are observed. Alternation between dependency and self-assertion is common. Susanna Kaysen