Impartialist

Part of speech: noun, adjective

Definitions

1. A person who judges fairly without favoring any side ; an adherent of the view that impartiality should guide moral or political conduct
2. Someone who refuses to take sides and treats all parties equally ; a believer that fairness and neutrality ought to be the foremost ethical standard
3. An individual committed to even-handed judgment in disputes ; a proponent of the doctrine that impartial treatment is the supreme principle of justice

Etymology: "Impartialist" is simply "impartial" with the suffix "-ist" added, and the suffix itself has a long pedigree. It descends from Ancient Greek "-istēs," an agent ending that marked a person who practised or followed something, and it reached English by way of Latin "-ista" and Old French "-iste," then Middle English "-ist." Through that route the same ending came to label followers of causes and schools of thought. Its base, "impartial," is the more interesting half: it is "partial" with the negative prefix "im-" attached, so it means not favouring one side. An impartialist, then, is a person who adopts that stance as a principle, someone committed to impartiality rather than merely practising it on a given occasion.