Proceeding as though things were normal when they actually are not. Presumably this expression came from the practice of posting a notice in an establishment announcing that its operations were continuing despite construction, fire, or some other hampering circumstance. From the time Winston Churchill said, in a speech in November 1914, “The maxim of the British people is ‘Business as usual,’” the expression was a slogan for the remainder of World War I. It later came to be used as a criticism—as, for example, when a public policy is continued even though it is no longer desirable or appropriate—and for blind complacency.