OP Gauba & (Other) Political Science Optional Books: post #63 — TG.ME

Totalitarianism 👉Totalitarianism is a form of government or political system that prohibits opposition parties, restricts individual opposition to the state and its claims, and exercises an extremely high degree of control over public and private life. 👉It is regarded as the most extreme and complete form of authoritarianism. 👉Totalitarian regimes are often characterized by ▪️Extensive political repression ▪️Complete lack of democracy ▪️Widespread personality cultism ▪️Absolute control over the economy ▪️Massive censorship ▪️Mass surveillance ▪️Limited freedom of movement (most notably freedom to leave the country) and ▪️Widespread use of state terrorism. 👉Other aspects of a totalitarian regime include: -Use of concentration camps -Repressive secret police -Religious persecution or state atheism -Common practice of executions -Fraudulent elections (if they take place) -Possible possession of weapons of mass destruction and -Potentially state-sponsored mass murder and genocides. 👉Historian Robert Conquest describes a totalitarian state as one which recognizes no limit on its authority in any sphere of public or private life and it extends that authority to whatever length is feasible. 👉Totalitarianism first developed in the 1920s by both Weimar jurist and later Nazi academic Carl Schmitt and concurrently the Italian fascists. Italian Fascist Benito Mussolini proclaimed: "Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state." 👉Schmitt used the term Totalstaat in his influential 1927 work "The Concept of the Political" on the legal basis of an all-powerful state. 👉The term gained prominence in Western anti-communist political discourse during the Cold War era as a tool to convert pre-World War II anti-fascism into post-war anti-communism. 👉Totalitarian regimes are different from other authoritarian regimes. The latter denotes a state in which the single power holder, usually an individual dictator, a committee, a junta or an otherwise small group of political elite, monopolizes political power. 👉In this sense, "the authoritarian state is only concerned with political power and as long as it is not contested it gives society a certain degree of liberty." 👉Authoritarianism "does not attempt to change the world and human nature." 👉In contrast, a totalitarian regime attempts to control virtually all aspects of the social life, including the economy, education, art, science, private life and morals of citizens. 👉Some totalitarian governments may promote an elaborate ideology, with "officially proclaimed ideology" penetrating "into the deepest reaches of societal structure and the totalitarian government seeks to completely control the thoughts and actions of its citizens." 👉It also mobilizes the whole population in pursuit of its goals. Carl Joachim Friedrich wrote that 1)A totalist ideology 2)A party reinforced by a secret police 3)Monopoly control of industrial mass society are the three features of totalitarian regimes that distinguish them from other autocracies. Credit: Wikipedia