否応(いやおう)なく

Forms

否(いや) (no, refusal) + 応(おう) (yes, consent) + なく (without)
Literally "without a yes or a no" — that is, without asking whether you agree.

• 否応(いやおう)なく - the standard adverbial form
• 否応(いやおう)なしに - same meaning, slightly more emphatic and a little more literary
• 有無(うむ)を言(い)わさず - without letting anyone object; stresses an agent overriding you, where 否応(いやおう)なく usually points at circumstances

Usage

否応(いやおう)なく modifies a verb, and that verb is nearly always one of being acted upon — a passive, or a change that happens to the subject:

• 否応(いやおう)なく巻(ま)き込(こ)まれる (to be drawn in regardless)
• 否応(いやおう)なく従(したが)う (to comply whether one likes it or not)
• 否応(いやおう)なく変(か)わる (to change inevitably)

It is not used of things the subject chose to do, so 否応なく行った sounds wrong unless the going was imposed.
The force is external — social change, an employer, the passage of time — and the speaker's own preference has been bypassed rather than overruled in argument. It is common in writing about society and history, and carries a note of resignation.

Similar words

• 必然(ひつぜん) - inevitability as a logical outcome; states that something had to follow, without the sense of a will being ignored