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totalitarianism: Definition, Synonyms from Answers.com
totalitarianism noun Absolute power, especially when exercised unjustly or cruelly: autocracy , despotism , dictatorship , tyranny.
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Totalitarianism
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Totalitarianism (or totalitarian rule) is a concept used to describe political systems whereby a state regulates nearly every aspect of public and private life. Totalitarian regimes or movements maintain themselves in political power by means of an official all-embracing ideology and propaganda disseminated through the state-controlled mass media, a single party that controls the state, personality cults, control over the economy, regulation and restriction of free discussion and criticism, the use of mass surveillance, and widespread use of state terrorism.
I NEVER supported Mrs Indira Gandhi who introduced Totalitarianism in Indian Politics for the first time! I had no ILLUSION with her slogan of Socialism and Poverty eradication!
When Indira Gandhi was made the prime Minister of India after the demise of Lal Bahadur Shashtri, I was still a student of Pitambar Pant in Haridaspur Primary Pathshala.
When she opted for socialism with her Indira Congress, I was a junior student in the High school.
My father led two major Mass Movements in 1956 and in 1958 as communist leader. he also visited Riot Torn Assam as a Communist leader in 1960.
Bengali Partition Victim refugees were on strike in 1956 while in 1958 there was a Peasant uprising in Nainital terai in 1958. In 1960.
My father Pulin Babu organised first Ever All India Bengali Refugee Conference out of Bengal in Dineshpur in 1960 while I was an INFANT.
While I learnt sentence making reading in class Two, I had to involve myself in Refugee and peasant affairs just because my father could not write better Hindi than me and all communications had to be made in Hindi!
I was shocked by the Assassination of John Kennedy in 1960. But the DEATH of Jawahar Lal Nehru did not invoke any sympathy within me as belonging to a Partition victim family and clan,every member of which was bleeding still!
We, the children, the first Generation of the resettled refugees despised Gandhi and Nehru holding them responsible for the partition of India!
I read the Hindutva ideology from the beginning and we were the regular Subscriber of kalayn Monthly dealing with Vedic literature exclusively.
We hoped that some day Netaji would come back and India would be REUNITED. It was universal EXPECTATION amongst the refugees as they were not so alienated from their homeland in East Bengal in sixties.
Being partition victims, we hated Two nation theory and also hated Jinnah and Muslim league as well as Pakistan. riots of 1964 and fresh INFLUX of refugees strengthened the sentiment.
Meanwhile, my DIDIMA, the mother of my Jethima belonging to the Orakandi Family of famous Harichand Guruchand Thakur migrated and landed in our family.
We were overjoyed with Indian Victory against Pakistan in 1965 war!
We were sad with the Untimely demise of Lal Bahadur Shashtri.
We had no SYMPATHY whatsoever with Mrs Indira gandhi while she took over superseding Morarji Desai and Babu Jagajivan Ram. The scenario changed during Bangladesh Liberation War while Bengali Refugee all over the country swung in favour of Mrs Gandhi!
Meanwhile, I read Netaji literature, the novels of GURUDUTTA dealing partition and SATYARTH Prakash by Swami Dayanand Saraswati.
Meanwhile, the Mother of Shaheede Aazam Sardar Bhagat Singh and freedom Fighter Shachin Buxy visited our home!
My MINDSET was Totally ANTI Congress!
I never could support CONGRESS anytime in future. But disillusioned with congress my father supported congress since 1960 as ND Tiwari joined the REFUGEE Conference and stood ROCK solid with the Resettled refugees in Uttar Pradesh! It did not change my mind!
Meanwhile, I got the RED BOOK thanks to the NAXALITES sheltered in the Teria during all out Repression in Bengal.
Meanwhile as a Junior student in Dineshpur High school , I led a strike against ZILA Parishad management.
Shyam Lal Verma, the Freedom fighter was the Zila Parishad Nainital President and my father was in the management of the School.
I left my home for months in 1970. I was transferred to the remote area of Shaktifarm for my EXTREMISM.
In 1971, my father visited Liberated Bangladesh. He was arrested in Dhaka, demanding Unification of Bengal to solve the REFUGEE Problem for ever! He was bailed out by his friends in media!
Returning from Bangladesh Jail, he entrusted to the REFUGEE Cause and supported Congress in a hope that Congress would get involved. he had been in contact of Mrs Gandhi thanks to ND TIWARI and KC Pant.
I was not convinced at any stage as I missed the REFUGEE policy of government of India and noted the Political game to make the Refugee Population a Mobile ruling Hegemony vote bank. Very soon, though I returned Dineshpur to finish the High School Course, I TURNED quite a Hard Core Anti State Power social activist. We, me and father ceased to discuss POLITICS since than and Never we did discuss Politics until his death!
As a student leader, I had to lead anti Emergency Movement in Uttarakhand!
Hence, I remember the EMERGENCY very well!
Now I am STRANDED in an ENVIRONMENT of EMERGENCY and TOTALITARIANISM in Bengal!
I did not fail to RECOGNISE TOTALITARIANISM taking over Bengal right in January, 1979, while MARICHJHANPI Ethnic Cleansing was ENACTED by the Marxist Manusmriti Apartheid Hegemony shaping in!
I only wonder, why the BENGALI INTELLIGENTSIA and the CIVIL society full of so many dignitaries, icons and Brands failed the do so during last Three DECADES!
It is so late! The Awakening may not be fruitful as the DEMOGRAPHY is manipulated for Infinite LEFT RULE in West Bengal, I am afraid of!
The TURNAROUND by the Intellectuals like Mrinal Sen, Gautam Ghosh, Mamta Shankar rather confuse me to assess the INTEGRITY and SANCTITY of the BENGALI Caste Hindu Intelligentsia! Whether they do want any CHANGE at all or are simply engaged to gain Personal and professional Mileage joining the Resistance hegemony equally BRAHAMINICAL and ABSOLUTE as far as the Indigenous, Aboriginal, Minority communities and the REFUGEES are concerned!
The anti-Left Front intellectuals kicked off a cerebral war, through a slogan, "We want change", portrayed through giant hoardings in many parts of Kolkata. Besides the slogan "We want change" written in bold letters, the hoardings also contain the pictures of the intellectuals and celebrities who are in favour of the "change".
The famous faces that appear in the hoarding include actress-turned-director, Aparna Sen, writer Mahashweta Devi, dancer Mamata Shankar, theatre personalities Shaoli Mitra, Kaushik Sen and Bibhash Chakrabarty and painter Shubhaprasanna.
Interestingly, many of these intellectuals and celebrities were known to be close confidants of the Left Front, especially the CPI(M), till about a couple of years ago.
The pro-Left Front intellectuals immediately sprang into action with the talking point: "Change that harms public interest is never acceptable." They have started raising their voices in favour of the Left Front through newspapers, TV programmes and public meetings.
The heavyweights on the list include renowned film directors Mrinal Sen and Tarun Majumdar, magician PC Sarkar, poet and educationalist Subodh Sarkar, writer Sunil Gangopadhyay and former cricket team captain Saurav Ganguly.
Explaining the rationale behind the "change", Mahashweta Devi said the Left Front government which they supported once is not the same today. "When the Left Front came to power in 1977, we supported them. I never thought we would have to oppose them ever. But I witnessed how the state government turned anti-people over the years," she said.
Echoing Mahashweta Devi, Shaoli Mitra said the fact that intellectuals in Bengal wants change is not a clandestine affair and they have expressed their desire for "change" in the last couple of years.
On the other hand, renowned film director, Tarun Majumdar has penned an article in Bengali daily Aajkal where he has explained why the "change" will be harmful for the people of Bengal.
"The people of Bengal understand that if the so-called change comes through, only they will suffer. In the past also, the people has not supported any force which will unleash a reign of terror and disorder in the state. I know this time too the people of Bengal will not make any mistake. Those who are fuelling the sentiment for change will be surely disheartened," Majumdar wrote.
Just remeber the day after Nadigram Massacre, while the Civil society and Intelligentsia joined hands with the Resistance against Marxist Totalitarianism! Thousands of people from varied field, including the intelligentsia, took out a protest march in Kolkata against the violence in West Bengal’s Nandigram area.
Demonstrators marched through the streets of Kolkata streets carrying placards and raising slogans against the Left Front Government headed by Chief Minister Buddhabed Bhattacharjee.
“It’s a protest. A protest against the continuing atrocities in Nandigram,” said eminent filmmaker Aparna Sen.
“Today thousands of people from all parts of Kolkata, the artists, the filmmakers, the dramatists, and the actors have joined the rally in protest of the massacre in Nandigram,” said eminent film director Supriya Sengupta.
The West Bengal Government had planned to set up a special export zoneSEZ) for chemical industries in Nandigram, 150 km southwest of Kolkata, but had to abort the project as villagers refused to give their farmland for the project.
In the last week, at least six villagers have been killed in Nandigram, as they fought CPI (M) cadres. Dozens of villagers were also injured in the clashes.
The row saw violent clashes between locals opposed to the project and the ruling Left Front supporters as well as the police.
The violence in Nandigram has been a political embarrassment for the Communist Party of India (Marxist), which is heading the Left Front Government in West Bengal.
The CPI (M) leaders and the police have blamed the Maoists for the recent violence in Nandigram.
But, the CPI (M)’s own allies have criticised the government, and some ministers in the government threatened to resign over Nandigram issue.
West Bengal will get 220 companies of central forces the highest among all states in the country for the three-phase Lok Sabha elections.
Election commissioner Veeravalli Sundaram Sampath made the announcement on Tuesday after extensive meetings with state officials, ahead of the first phase of polls on April 30. Sampath said, "The allotment is made on the basis of requisition by the state government and the availability of forces." The government had asked for 240 companies and the EC could sanction 220, considering the law-and-order situation in the state.
The issue of law and order assumed greater importance after People's Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCPA) announced on Tuesday that the forces deployed would have to take responsibility of people's security though the tribal body would cooperate with the administration in the poll process.
PCPA spokesperson Chhatradhar Mahato assured they would help villagers reach polling stations. "It is for the state government to be responsible for voters' security. We expect the administration will take measures to ensure their safe return to villages," he said, warning that no security personnel would be allowed inside Lalgarh villages and that deployment of forces must be restricted to five polling stations being set up in the fringes of Lalgarh. The police deployment would remain only for the 12 hours of polling.
PCPA announced that apart from police, administrative employees may be allowed inside villages to escort voters to the booths.
Earlier, EC had assured them that polling booths would be set up within 5 km of each village in Lalgarh, but in reality, voters will have to travel 7-10 km to reach their booths. The nearest booth from villages like Orma, Sijua, Chotopelia or Shaluka of Lalgarh are beyond 5 km.
Apart from the 140 companies of central forces, a 5,000-strong state force of police, fire and forest department officials will be deployed in West Midnapore, Purulia and Bankura. Around 5,000 home guards will also be posted in the three districts. State police has already hired two helicopters for dropping poll officials near polling stations located in the remote corners of the districts.
Police and security personnel have already started combing operations along the district and state borders to flush out the guerrillas. Police fear that Maoists may attack polling booths or officials, and they are especially concerned about Lalgarh. For emergencies, another copter is being kept on standby. However, top officials are not disclosing the deployment blueprint of the forces because a threat looms large.
Intelligence agencies have asked state counterparts to make sure that state agencies check the entire route of central force movement with anti-landmine vehicles, especially in disturbed areas. Police have also alerted local hospitals and even those in Jamshedpur and Ranchi.
Sampath and deputy election commissioner R Balakrishnan discussed the last-minute poll arrangements in the 14 constituencies going to polls on April 30 with district magistrates and SPs over video conferencing on Tuesday.
Sampath said, "Some of the forces will be retained after the polls to tackle post-poll violence." The election commissioner also met political parties who "expressed apprehensions about some areas." Sampath said, "We got very specific requests from political parties for Keshpur, Sabang, Pingla, Chandrakona and Darjeeling. We have decided to deploy additional observers in Sabang, Ghatal, Bishnupur and Darjeeling." Ghatal would get two observers and Sabang, Bishnupur and Darjeeling one each.
Times of India Reports:
Chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee on Tuesday fell back on his biggest USP the promise of fast-tracking industrialization to drum up
support for the Left ahead of elections to 14 Lok Sabha constituencies in Bengal which would be held on Thursday.
Addressing a meeting of the Calcutta Citizens' Initiative an association of eminent individuals from different streams, including a few mid-rung industrialists just 48 hours before the poll bugle is sounded in the state, the CM held out hope that mega projects announced earlier such as the numerous steel plants and petrochem hub were bound to come up, despite pressures induced by the global economic meltdown.
"I just can't accept the Opposition position. They are opposing everything, even the extension of national highways and acquisition of land for a thermal power plant at Katwa. But, I accept the challenge since I believe in people power and not muscle power," Bhattacharjee told a gathering at the G D Birla Sabhagar, which also included Nicco's Rajive Kaul and Titagarh Wagon's J P Chowdhary from the industrialist fraternity.
"I have spoken to Sajjan Jindal and he has assured me that the JSW plant would definitely come up despite the problems in raising funds from banks at the moment," the CM added. Incidentally, Jindal has already gone on record that the proposed 10-million tonne plant at Salboni, which was originally supposed to entail an investment of Rs 35,000 crore, could be delayed because of the current tough economic climate.
Bhattacharjee whose industrialization policies had helped disparate Opposition parties to join hands said his government had taken lessons from the mistakes committed earlier in acquiring land. "Our intention was not bad. I have no personal preference for cars. All I wanted to see was the smiling faces of thousands of workers at Singur. We wanted to make Nandigram another Haldia. But the Opposition played a destructive role," he asserted.
However, the state was in the process of setting up a land bank largely comprising fallow land at a cost of Rs 500 crore to ensure that plots could be handed over to companies quicker. A rehabilitation package was also being drawn up for affected landlosers. "We are negotiating with a Czech company for a mass rapid transit system," he added.
Earlier, other speakers invited at the programme said the electorate should teach the Opposition a lesson for its negative brand of politics. "We have to ensure that agitational politics is washed away from the shores of West Bengal," town planner R M Kapoor said. "The intellectuals who are seeking change through hoardings should have the courage to specify what change they want," painter Sunil Das said.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Cities/Industry-well-on-track-CM-/articleshow/4461421.cms
Mamata Banerjee is the chief of All India Trinamool Congress Party, a party she formed in 1998 after parting ways with the Congress. A South Kolkata MP since 1991, she aligned with the NDA in the 1998, 1999 and 2004 Lok Sabha elections. In 2009, however, this firebrand leader is aligning with the Congress to consolidate the anti-Left vote bank. She has been railway minister in the Vajpayee government and a Minister of Sports and Youth Affairs in the Narsimha Rao Government. Last year, she made news with her vehement protests against the Tata Group’s acquisition of land for the construction of its small car Nano in Singur. Ultimately, the Tatas had to make an exit from the state. In over three decades of Left rule in West Bengal, Mamata Banerjee has emerged as the only constant face of Opposition in the state.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009 at 11 : 26
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CPI(M) architect of misrule in Bengal
The people of West Bengal want change. This desire is a sign of healthy parliamentary democracy as its foundation lies in change. For 32 years, the CPI(M) has been ruling the state by hook or by crook. This does not reflect well on the political situation in Bengal. Today the incumbent government does not have the support of the masses. This supposedly 'improved' Left Front Government is running on the wheels of money power, muscle power and the state machinery. The architect of this design is the CPI(M) and it is their misrule that has put Bengal into dire straits. The state is lagging behind in every aspect, be it social, economic, political or cultural. Needless to say, the state has made no progress in these 32 years.
During the Left rule, poverty, unemployment and starvation have seen a meteoric rise. The CPI(M) is killing democracy in West Bengal and the democratic institutions are under the control of that one the party. Such autocracy is strangulating the democratic and basic human rights of the people. Every section of society is suffering from the iron rule.
The CPI(M), which is rapidly losing base, has done nothing for the upliftment of the state. Rather they have been responsible for the dismal condition of Bengal. The government which had pledged to work for the people has now turned against them and is running the state with utter disregard to political ethics. They are no longer in touch with the masses. In fact the CPI(M) has consistently used the party and the state machinery to terrorise the state electorate.
Their 32-year-rule has been the biggest obstacle to the state's progress. The end of the CPI(M) rule is the only way to put Bengal back on the tracks of development. This party has imposed itself on the people of Bengal and no progress is possible before they are dislodged. And it is the CPI(M) which is standing between Bengal and her development.
(Orginally written in Bengali. Translated by Subhajit Sengupta)
Posted by Mamata Banerjee |57 comments
http://ibnlive.in.com/blogs/mamatabanerjee/2446/53353/cpim-architect-of-misrule-in-bengal.html
Tata Nano, Mamata keno!
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Why has the Bengali civil society forsaken Bengal?
Na-No.
You could say Na in Bengali and you would be with Mamata and you could say No in English and you would be with the Didi. Whichever way you look at it, Trinamool firebrand Mamata Banerjee seems to have hit a winner. Yes, this sounds facetious and could be viewed as trivializing the issue. But how else do you view a conflict where subaltern minds have collectively plotted the death of thought, debate and common good, where the thinking mind has yielded ground to a hegemony of politicians that appears Gramscian in a sense?
Which makes you wonder why Bengali civil society has forsaken Bengal. It was said at one time that what Bengal thinks today, India thinks tomorrow. It seems the intellectuals who never shy of articulating their views have fallen silent, allowing Bengal to lapse into a time warp. It would seem what Bengal thinks today is what was discarded by the world in the 20th Century. The tragedy is that the hegemony of vote-bank politics will make Bengal, already a trailer in most development indices, a loser. Worse Bengalis will lose much more than politicians.
Once the home to giants like Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, Rabindranath Tagore, Jagdish Chandra Bose, Satyendra Nath Bose and the legions of writers, artists and scholars, Bengal is now home to the largest collection of retarders. How else would you describe the Marxists who have fostered this mindset for three generations and other political parties who are as regressive as the Reds?
Why should it be only Mukesh Ambani, Sunil Mittal, K.V. Kamath or N.R. Narayanmurthy who should worry about the sullying of India's and Bengal's image? Why is it only a corporate concern? Surely economic development is not just a concern for those operating on Lyons Range or Dalal Street. Is it a matter of pride for Bengal boasting a literacy of nearly 70 per cent that it should rank just above Bihar in India's Investment Index? In any civil society, the moderate voice cannot afford to be silent. Indeed the extreme Left or Right wants the moderate voice to be silent, to be silenced, to be killed. Every time there is a terror attack leading intellectuals rant on the editorial pages of newspapers and on television shows about the need for moderate Muslims to come out and speak. Those on the marquee of achievement and success in Bengal need to come out and speak. Whether they are for or against, whichever their view. Bengal cannot be circumscribed by the views of the lurching Left, the lumpen Right or lazy vote collectors.
Is this the view Bengali civil society wants to portray to the world? Of a society that cannot speak, that will not stand up for its view and that is yielding space to the worst kind of politics? This is not just politics nor is it just business either. It is a direct reflection of the deteriorating culture of the state. Will the future of Bengal and Bengalis be determined by those seeking cheap popularity and votes?
Perhaps there hasn't been a forum, perhaps there hasn't been an occasion for them to come together. Maybe it is just one lone voice. But remember what Gurudev said: "Jodi tor daak shune keu na ashe tobe ekla cholo re". The chorus will be heard once you start walking. This is the tipping point. Someone must take the lead. A society that heralded the cause of widow remarriage, of political independence, of free thought, sublime art and fluid poetry cannot recede in the background. It must rediscover that courage and seize the moment to spell it out. They could start by saying Na and No to the kind of flip flop politics practised by those in the ring and those seeking to get spectatorship points.
Say Na and No to the hegemony of the politicians.
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=Tata-Nano-Mamata-keno!-14319.html&Itemid=&main_category=Locus%20Standi&contentid=14319
Army on high alert, claims terrorist waiting across to infiltrate
Over the last month, terrorists have made two major infiltration bids, which were partly successful, Vice Chief of Army Staff Lt Gen Noble Thamburaj told reporters in New Delhi.
However, most of the infiltrators were neutralised in the second tier of security along the LoC, he added.
"We have realised that there are some more terrorists who are waiting in their launch pads and training camps, ready to be launched (into India)," he said.
"The Indian Army has done redeployment (of troops to counter infiltration)...We have built in additional surveillance capabilities to look across LoC ... We have deployed more technical equipment for surveillance even at most difficult places keeping the LoC under active patrolling and surveillance at all times," the Army Vice Chief said.
Thamburaj said infiltration bids have been "timed around" Lok Sabha elections.
After a visit to forward areas of Jammu and Kashmir, Army Chief Gen Deepak Kapoor said on Tuesday that 54 militants had infiltrated into India in March.
Sources in the government said the infiltration was being supported by the Pakistani establishment.
We don't want to be Congress' palanquin bearers: Karat
CPI(M) foresees a realignment of political forces after the Lok Sabha elections in favour of the Third Front and rules out supporting Congress in government formation as it does not not want to be its "palanquin bearers". The party says it will also "very seriously" consider joining a non-Congress secular government and does not outrightly rule out the possibility of heading such a formation.
In a wide-ranging interview to PTI, CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat spoke on various issues including on how the Left parties would approach the Indo-US nuclear deal, an issue on which they withdrew support to the UPA government, and on the Sri Lankan issue. He was not in agreement with NCP leader Sharad Pawar that the Left parties would have to support the Congress and the UPA it heads in the post-poll scenario to keep the BJP out.
"We don't have to be palanquin bearers for anyone. There is no danger of BJP coming to power at the Centre this time. The choice will be a non-Congress secular government or a Congress-led government. I don't think the BJP is going to be in the picture," Karat said. He said in fact more parties would join the Third
Front after the elections. "We expect a realignment of forces after the elections. I am saying parties which are not with us now will come towards us," he said.
The overall trend, Karat said, has been very clear that the UPA has practically ceased to exist. Most of the parties (of the UPA) are finding their own way and parting company with the Congress as far as the elections are concerned. "All these parties will have to decide after the elections what they propose to do," he said. But when asked whether the realignment could also affect his combination, the CPI(M) leader said the parties of the Front have come into the grouping with the aim of defeating both the Congress and the BJP and their respective allies in the states.
"We have already discussed that we need to carry forward this after the Lok Sabha elections and to see that we form a government at the Centre. The regional parties that have joined with the Left parties have a stake in this project," he said. Asked if he had parties like RJD and LJP in mind when he talked about realignment, Karat said the Front has made a general appeal to all non-Congress secular parties to come together on a joint platform for pro-people economic and independent foreign policies and in defence of secularism. "Many of these parties share this approach and it is up to them to decide," he said.
To another question about Pawar's statement that the Congress and the UPA cannot ignore the Left and have to do business with it after the elections, Karat said "his intentions are good. "But as far as we are concerned, we cannot accept and support a Congress-led government. We are working for a government which will be a non-Congress secular one."
Asked if he would mind the Congress being part of it, the CPI(M) leader said it was for the Congress to decide whether it would facilitate formation of a secular government. "It is for them to decide." He dismissed a view that the position of Congress and the Left was only posturing before elections. "Let us see what happens. After the elections, everybody's position will become clear. My party adopts a political line. It is not some on-the-spur of the moment decision. "We have adopted a political line in which we have called for the defeat of Congress and the BJP and the formation of an alternative secular government. We will work for that to succeed. Let us see."
Asked about the possibility of the CPI(M) joining government at the Centre unlike in 1996 when it spurned an offer, Karat said it had been a long-standing policy (not to join a government if it cannot influence its policies) and it would take a decision after the elections.
Karat said "but we cannot say what type of government will be formed after the elections. If a non-Congress and secular government is feasible, then the matter will be taken up by us." He said last time, the matter was not not taken up very seriously because it was a Congress-led government and the party did not want to join it. "As I said, if there is a non-Congress government, the matter will be considered very seriously," he said.
Asked if the party would agree to have its own Prime Minister if an opportunity came its way, Karat said "first of all, let us discuss whether we will join a government. Then we will see what is to be done. "There are various factors we have to take into account when we decide to join a government. So let us first see what are those circumstances and then we will take a decision," the CPI(M) leader said.
On his assessment of the polls so far, he said it was clear there was a three-way contest between Congress and its allies, BJP and its allies and the non-Congress, non-BJP combination. In states like Orissa, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala, the parties of the Third Front were ahead, he said. To a question about Pawar's view that CPI(M) and BSP together would not cross 65-70 seats and the Third Front would not be in a position to form a government, he said Pawar has forgotten parties like BJD, TDP, JD(S), AIADMK, PMK and others of this front.
Naxals call for a vote boycott in Lalgarh
Such is the tension level that the district administration has deployed 71 companies of para-military forces in Lalgarh, Belpahari and Salboni areas which are under the control of the Maoists. A total 81 companies of paramilitary forces have been deployed in the entire West Midnapore district.
Mr Ardhendu Sen, West Bengal home secretary and IG (Western Range) Mr Kuldip Singh on Wednesday visisted some Maoist infested zones and assured people to help them usuing their franchise.
Significantly, Police Santras Birodhi Peoples Committee (PSBPC) leader Chhatradhar Mahato told ET on Wednesday that they have not given the vote boycott call on Thursday.
"We are not boycotting the polls. The administration has decided to provide transport to the electorate of 49 booths located in this region to enable them to reach safer places at Lalgarh like the R.K.Vidyalaya, Ramgarh M.S.High School, Pirakata H.S School, and Bhimpur H.S.School.
If the administration really provides transport to some 40,000 voters, we have no objection. We will not prevent them from travelling to safer places to exercise their franchise."
But it appears that voters from the remote villages may eventually not be able to avail of the opportunity being provided by the state administration.
This is because these villages are located in far flung areas where there is no road connectivity and they will need to walk 7 to 8 km to hit the main roads to board the state vehicles. It is the CPI (Maoists) which has given the vote boycott call on Thursday.
The PSBPC too has urged the people of Belpahari to boycott the central forces. As a result of the boycott call, the BSF jawans who had been petrolling duties at Belpahari were not allowed to purchase food and even drinking water in the region on Wednesday.
Angry jawans assaulted one shop owner in Belpahari after they were refused food and drinking water by the shop owner. In protest against the assault on the local shop owner, the PSBPC activists blocked the Belpahari-Banspahari Road which is still continuing till 6-30 p.m. on Wednesday.
Interestingly, the PSBPC on Monday had forced the district administration to withdraw a BSF camp in Kalaimuri. On Tuesday, the same PSBPC had confined a group of BSF jawans at Kadashole village under Goaltore police station in West Midnapore district as the para-military force jawans had attempted to inspect the booths in these area.
The jawans were confined for several hours and later released on condition that they would not enter the area on Thursday when elections to the Jhargram lok sabha will be held.
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So, after a tiring week, many gathered at a city lounge bar to let their hair down in style. And yes, one needed no eavesdropping to figure out that the most discussed topics on the celebs’ chit-chat list were the most expected ones — recession, the heat and IPL.
So, as many kept wondering whether the nightclubs were feeling the recession heat, model Anando showed more interest in the ‘real’ heat that’s becoming maddening by the day. “It’s so hot outside. To make matters worse, there’s no respite when one gets home, thanks to the power cuts. I feel like staying here forever,” he said. Actor Chandreyee Ghosh, who’s not much of a party animal, said, “It’s important to unwind after a week’s hard work.”
With Parno around and her friendship with cricketer Ranadeb Bose generating all the hot goss, IPL had to be THE topic of the evening. When the actor was asked whether she had seen good friend Ranadeb in action, she replied, “I missed it because of my shooting schedule. When I finally managed to get a glimpse of the match, all I saw was that Yuvi had embraced him in a tight hug.”
A totalitarian society
T.K. OOMMEN, PROFESSOR, JAWAHARLAL NEHRU UNIVERSITY
| “Democracy cannot really flourish as long as exclusionary structures still exist in society.”. |
That India is the largest democracy in the world is an oft-repeated cliché but hardly anybody certifies it to be a successful democracy. The most important obstacle in the flowering of democracy in India is the persisting totalitarianism of Indian society.
India’s is a four-in-one society. Like all societies, Indian society too is socially stratified based on gender, class, age, rural-urban disparities and the like causing discrimination and exploitation which can be tackled through appropriate social engineering. As with most contemporary societies, Indian society is also culturally heterogeneous due to the presence of a large number of religious and linguistic communities. In spite of the mind-boggling linguistic diversity of India, democratic participation is facilitated through the formation of politico-administrative units, the provincial States, based on language. And yet the democratic process stands diminished because two linguistic categories do not have the possibility of fuller participation: One, those linguistic groups which do not have their own cultural homelands as they are spatially dispersed and two, those who migrate from their linguistic homelands to other regions/States. However, this is a problem which exists in most multi-lingual polities.
The remaining two features — externalisation and hierarchy — are the ones which render Indian society totalitarian. Externalisation is the process through which fellow citizens are defined and treated as cultural outsiders. There are two types of externalisations in India which block the flowering of democracy. One is the product of turbulence created by migration from one cultural region to another within the country, articulated through nativism. This undermines the principle of single citizenship mandated in the Constitution. The other variety of externalisation is qualitatively different in that a set of co-citizens are perceived and defined as outsiders to the entire society, which becomes the bases of discrimination and exclusion. Thus, in India, followers of some religious faiths, notably Muslims and Christians, who together account for 16 per cent of India’s population, that is 160 million, are viewed as cultural outsiders by some elements in civil society. This erodes deeply the democratic ethos of Indian polity as it alienates a substantial segment of Indian population from Indian society and polity.
The other element, which contributes to totalitarianism of Indian society, is hierarchy, the product of caste system, which is unique to India, leading to the abominable practice of untouchability. The ex-untouchables of India now constitute 18 per cent, that is 180 million, of the Indian population. Caste system not only institutionalised inequality but also sanctified it through the Hindu doctrines of creation, of varnashrama dharma, of karma and rebirth and the like. Although some would argue that there is no organic relationship between Hinduism and the caste system, in reality they are inextricably intertwined. All available evidence suggests that caste system is antithetical to the ethos of democracy.
The two totalitarian elements of Indian society conjointly erode individual autonomy, a pre-requisite for authentic democracy. When groups and communities are perceived as cultural outsiders they tend to insulate themselves socially in spite of internal differentiation among them. In turn this breeds alienation and a segment of this population resorts to aggression and violence. Similarly, when a group is eternally condemned to be inferiors, they remain in a psychological cage of their own and can rarely can participate as equals in economy, polity and society.
The two categories, religious minorities and the Scheduled Castes, the victims of externalisation and hierarchy respectively, account for more than one-third of Indian citizens. Without their fully-fledged participation in all walks of life, one cannot think of a flourishing democracy in India.
http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mag/2008/08/10/stories/2008081050030100.htm
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Totalitarianism in India
From Censorship Wikia, the free censorship database
Being the largest democracy in the world, it is a matter of great offense and disgrace for the Indian people to have their governement take away their right to SPEAK--regardless of the medium or the duration of this censorship.
India is becoming no different than other Totalitarian regimes.
I posted this on my blogsite at Wordpress, which luckily, escaped the invading eyes of the Indian government:
Only a few minutes ago, I found out via this Indian blogger about the news that INDIA HAS BANNED BLOGS HOSTED ON BLOGGER, BLOGSPOT, TYPEPAD, and GEOCITIES! Earlier in the week, I emailed Jason asking him if the blogger platform was down–as blogger is known to be frequently down. However, he replied saying that nothing was wrong on his end, and that he was able to access his own and others’ blogspot accounts. Jason also added a comment, that now in hindsight is freakin omninous! He wondered if the Indian government had deliberately shut down the access to these blogs. I mentally dismissed that idea. India, afterall, is the world’s largest democracy! Hardly the kind of government you would expect to be getting all paranoid over democractic opinions on the internet. PAH! How wrong I was! INDIA IS A TOTALITARIAN REGIME! IT IS CURRENTLY IN VIOLATION OF THE FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN RIGHT TO FREE SPEECH! Read all about this highly offensive story: [O]n July 15, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) had sent ISPs a list of sites to be blocked. R H Sharma, senior engineer with MTNL, said the list ran into some 22 pages. Read more on fellow blogger responses here. Incidentally, Wordpress has escaped the invasive eyes of the Indian government. Also, some private Indian ISP providers are still allowing access to some sites. However, it seems like only a matter of time before things get worse in this totalitarian country. UPDATE: According to Mutiny, “there is no ban in place”, rather it is the Indian Government instructing ISP’s to “control” access to a list of sites… hmmm… “control access”… that, in one word, is censorship! I can’t fathom how blind Mutiny has to be to not see this for what it is–a blatant violation of our rights! We have lost our freedom to SPEAK! Daniel left an apt comment in response to Mutiny’s post. He said: and in other news, The Indian Government has decided to turn off the water supply as it has been reported that the terrorists use water to live Its always good to see that any government has intelligent people making all the decisions. Apparently, it’s a move on the part of the government to crack down on terrorists who are communicating through these blogs. Well, this is news to me! I had no clue that Innommable, John Enright, Jason Hughes, Tyrel, and other blogspot bloggers are in fact terrorists. You guys, I thought we were pretty open with each other!
Rahul's Purulia comment earns Biman wrath
Times of India - 18 hours agoThe LF chairman was also of the firm belief that Congress chairperson Sonia Gandhi had not done her homework while commenting on Nandigram. ...Left will not take democracy lessons from Sonia, Rahul Economic TimesUneasy calm prevails in Nandigram
Times of India - Apr 25, 2009NANDIGRAM: Nasir Ali walks across the Bhangabera bridge with some trepidation. He has heard of some firing in the Garhchakraberia area. ...Kshiti covers Buddha in the firing line on Nandigram Expressindia.comAlly bares Nandi fangs Calcutta TelegraphPoll twitter picks up on campuses Times of IndiaWomen on the warpath
Express Buzz - 13 hours agoOne is that the Singur and Nandigram episodes have given the Trinamool Congress a boost, at least in the countryside, which was reflected in a recent ...Congress, BJP get a Buddha rap, Left a pat Indian ExpressIndia's gradual slide into pessimism Express BuzzKarat(e) Kid turns Sensei
IBNLive.com - Apr 27, 2009Though ideologically Karat was more close to Pandhe, he could do nothing to change the course of the party until Nandigram happened. ...Left Front running dictatorship in West Bengal: Sonia Gandhi
Hindustan Times - Apr 27, 2009Referring to the violent incidents in Nandigram and Singur, she said: "These people (the Left) call themselves messiahs and sympathisers of the poor and ...Chair closer, gap closes Calcutta TelegraphSonia-Mamta share dais in Murshidabad SamayLiveSonia, Mamata close the gap, go after Left Expressindia.comCPM, Trinamool clash in Nandigram
Indian Express - Apr 24, 2009Fresh tension erupted in Nandigram following a clash between Trinamool Congress and CPM supporters at Takapura village on late Thursday night. ...Fresh trouble in Nandigram Times of India18 injured in clash IndopiaBuddha ordered firing in Nandigram: Forward Bloc
Expressindia.com - Apr 20, 2009Kolkata A senior Left Front leader on Monday disclosed that it was Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee who had ordered police firing in Nandigram on ...CM ordered Nandigram firing: FB The StatesmanFresh firing in Nandigram to scare women
The Statesman - Apr 23, 2009TAMLUK, April 23: Gun shots rang out in villages of Nandigram again as police fired two rounds in the air to disperse CPI-M women workers. ...OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT Calcutta TelegraphGhosh blames media for sparking off controversy The StatesmanNandigram-II has West Bengal govt running scared
Times of India - Apr 21, 2009LALGARH: Another Nandigram is brewing in West Bengal. Yet again there are fears of a virtual civil war. The state government seems to be groping to handle ...Maoist victory Indian ExpressNandigram villagers attack police team
Times of India - Apr 17, 2009NANDIGRAM: Trinamool Congress supporters attacked a police team and damaged their vehicle in Nandigram when the latter went to arrest a party supporter on ...Police jeeps ransacked in Nandigram Kolkata Newsline“In West Bengal, development has stalled under the totalitarian rule of CPM for 30 years,” he said. Significantly, he did not mention her former NDA ally ...
www.indianexpress.com/news/advani-spits-fire-at-upa-worst-government-ever/431991/0 - 60k - Cached - Similar pages -Welcome to Beach Tree Bengals where my Bengals rule!
10 Sep 2007 ... Beach Tree Bengal is a TICA cattery raising quality Bengal kittens in Tennessee, specializing in black ink rosettes, glittered pelts, ...
www.beachtreebengal.com/ - 8k - Cached - Similar pages -The Hindu : Front Page : No chance for third front, says Advani
But in West Bengal the situation is peculiar. Development is stunted and stagnation continues because of totalitarian rule where there is no opposition and ...
www.hindu.com/2009/03/07/stories/2009030755801200.htm - 22k - Cached - Similar pages -The Telegraph - Calcutta (Kolkata) | Opinion | The borderland and ...
9 Dec 2008 ... The shooting of a girl in a border village in West Bengal makes .... grip of some surreal military or totalitarian rule that the daylight of ...
www.telegraphindia.com/1081209/jsp/opinion/story_10222603.jsp - 40k - Cached - Similar pages -Transforming West Bengal - Changing the Agenda for an Agenda for ...
- 22 Apr26 Feb 2009 ... In 5 years, West Bengal can become a completely different State. ... The State will possibly become a totalitarian one if there be only one ... because the economic story of West Bengal under Left Rule has to be told. ...
www.indicus.net/media/index.php/2009/1324-transforming-west-bengal-changing-the-agenda-for-an-agenda-for-change - 55k - Cached - Similar pages -The Asian Age - Enjoy the difference
Left running a dictatorship in Bengal: Sonia. Age Correspondents ... But in their rule, poor peasants had to face violence when they opposed acquisition of their ... Actually, in the name of democracy, it is a totalitarian regime." ...
www.asianage.com/presentation/leftnavigation/news/top-story/left-running-a-dictatorship-in-bengal-sonia.aspx - 21k - Cached - Similar pages -George Orwell (British author) -- Britannica Online Encyclopedia
... latter a profound anti-Utopian novel that examines the dangers of totalitarian rule. ... born 1903, Motīhāri, Bengal, India died Jan. 21, 1950, London ...
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Sodrol argues that the while both authoritarians and totalitarianism are forms of ... authoritarians support their rule by a mixture of instilling fear and ... However, some others ascribe the Bengal famine of 1943 to the effects of ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authoritarianism - 81k - Cached - Similar pages -Indiadaily.com - The fight between common people of West Bengal ...
7 Nov 2007 ... People of West Bengal had enough with these communists and the Indian ... brainwashed people of West Bengal and rules the economically declining ... It is a form of totalitarian regime like China within the framework of ...
www.indiadaily.com/editorial/18641.asp - 21k - Cached - Similar pages -A PREHISTORY OF RIGHTS: THE AGE OF CONSENT DEBATE IN COLONIAL ...
The age of consent debates in Bengal in 1891, and the many meanings that were .... might lead to an abridgement of the community's totalitarian rule. ...
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USING INDIA TO SQUEEZE TOTALITARIANISM?
Posted on 30 March 2005 by Robert Mayer
A few significant things have happened in this arena besides the sale of fighter jets to both Pakistan and India. Secretary of State Rice has recently said that the U.S. aims to make India a world power in the 21st century.
Washington: The United States unveiled plans Friday to help India become a “major world power in the 21st century” even as it announced moves to beef up the military of Pakistan.
Under the plans, Washington offered to step up a strategic dialogue with India to boost missile defense and other security initiatives as well as high-tech cooperation and expanded economic and energy cooperation.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has presented to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh the Bush administration’s outline for a “decisively broader strategic relationship” between the world’s oldest and largest democracies, a senior US official said.
“Its goal is to help India become a major world power in the 21st century,” said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“We understand fully the implications, including military implications, of that statement.”
He did not elaborate but noted that South Asia was critical, with China on one side, Iran and West Asia on the other, and a somewhat turbulent Central Asian region to the north.
I was actually having a discussion on this with Bill Rice a few days ago. Here’s the relevant part that I observed:
With Condi as our new Secretary of State, we’ve been diverting much more to regional powers of late. A major case thus far has been India. India has done an amazing job with helping in the tsunami crisis, and currently they are handling the democratic crisis in Nepal. The new U.S. foreign policy seems to build strong democratic societies that can then exert influence on budding or established problem/communist states. With China enforcing its naval power in the straits and Indonesia, a powerful and populous ally against the communist mainland right next door is certainly in our strategic interest.
Now there’s one more thing I want to add to that, with regards to “turbulent Central Asia.” This, in particular, has to do with gas pipeline revenues to specific hostile governments.
For the time being the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) does not correspond much to the OPEC configuration. Some experts believe, however, that precisely Russia will determine gas prices on a future integrated market.
Combining the efforts of Russia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, which own immense gas resources, is an objective condition for creating a large regional gas alliance. Available sales markets, like India, Pakistan, China and some other countries, make this idea even more attractive.
There is a lot of gas in these regions and the profits from it help to keep some ugly regimes afloat. If these were to expand, certainly it could extend their lifetimes. If they are marginalized, however…
NEW DELHI, March 29: The surprise US offer of nuclear cooperation with India, specially for power production, has thrown the entire Indian geo-strategic planning into disarray with the future of gas pipelines from Iran and Myanmar clouded with uncertainty.
While the Foreign and Defense Ministries in New Delhi are jubilant, the Petroleum and Natural Gas Ministry is suddenly apprehensive as nuclear power stations set up with US help could offset the need of long and insecure pipelines this ministry was preparing to lay.
Indian Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister, Mani Shanker Aiyar is, at present, on an official tour of the Middle East to probe the possibilities to cater to the energy needs of India. In the coming months, Aiyer has to hold talks with his counterparts in Iran, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Myanmar for these proposed gas pipelines. But the US proposal of civil nuclear energy cooperation has entirely changed the energy scenario.
Bush Administration????????s offer of nuclear cooperation was part of a series of measures to upgrade the Indo-US Strategic Partnership, which includes supply of F-18 fighter jets and nuclear safety cooperation to India.
The Foreign Ministry has welcomed the offer for nuclear technology and cooperation in the field of nuclear safety, describing it as a “a welcome step which reflects an understanding of India’s growing energy requirements.???????
It’s an interesting move for setting up a checkmate, that’s for sure. This particular deal has to do with Iran, something that would both slow the Iranian theocracy’s influence and boost U.S. prominence in the region. In the larger picture, I think stunting demand from one of the world’s biggest future energy demanders would accelerate the decline of governents with such vast gas resources. What do all of you think? Could India be a possible ace the U.S. has up its sleeve?
UPDATE: Bill has more on the U.S.-India strategic partnership, with him and Simon engaging in discussion over it. Bill Roggio also has a lot more.
| I | Introduction |
Totalitarianism, in political science, system of government and ideology in which all social, political, economic, intellectual, cultural, and spiritual activities are subordinated to the purposes of the rulers of a state. Several important features distinguish totalitarianism, a form of autocracy peculiar to the 20th century, from such older forms as despotism, absolutism, and tyranny. In the older forms of autocracy people could live and work in comparative independence, provided they refrained from politics. In modern totalitarianism, however, people are made utterly dependent on the wishes and whims of a political party and its leaders. The older autocracies were ruled by a monarch or other titled aristocrat who governed by a principle such as divine right, whereas the modern totalitarian state is ruled by a leader, or dictator, who controls a political party.
| II | Totalitarian Governments |
Those countries whose governments are usually characterized as totalitarian were Germany, under the National Socialism of Adolf Hitler; the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), particularly under Joseph Stalin; and the People’s Republic of China, under the Communist rule of Mao Zedong (Mao Tse-tung). Other governments have also been called totalitarian, such as those of Italy under Benito Mussolini, North Korea under Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il, Syria under Hafez al-Assad, and Iraq under Saddam Hussein.
| III | The Party and Its Tools |
Under a dictator, members of the ruling party become the elite of the nation. The entire society is subjected to a hierarchical organization wherein each individual is responsible to another in a position of higher authority—with the single exception of the supreme leader, who is answerable to no one. All nongovernmental social groupings are either destroyed totally or coordinated to serve the purposes of the party and the state.
Total subjection of the individual became possible only through advanced science and industrial technology. Among the decisive, technologically conditioned features of totalitarian dictatorships are a monopoly of mass communications, a terroristic secret-police apparatus, a monopoly of all effective weapons of destruction, and a centrally controlled economy.
| A | Control of Mass Communications |
By virtue of the monopoly of mass communications the ruling party and the government are in possession of all channels through which people receive information, guidance, and direction. All newspaper, magazine, and book publishing, as well as radio and television broadcasting, theater productions, and motion pictures, is centrally controlled and directed. All writers, speakers, actors, composers, and poets are enrolled in party-controlled organizations, and they are licensed by the government. Usually they are required to be members of the party. The party line, that is, the party’s interpretation of policy, is imposed on all mass media through censorship.
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Totalitarianism in Europe (1919 - 1939)
Introduction
In the years immediately after the First World War, a promising new era of democracy seemed to be unfolding. The autocratic regimes in Russia, Germany and Austria, were all overthrown and replaced by republics. The seven newly-created states in Europe all adopted the republican form of government. Democracy seemed triumphant in the post-war world. Yet within two decades, many democratic countries in Europe were taken over by some kind of dictatorship. Russia became a Communist state. Italy and Germany became Fascist states. Of the powers in Europe, only Britain and France remained staunchly democratic. Actually the First World War brought some negative effects to Europe.(See the results of the First World War)
Before we proceed, perhaps we should have an understanding of the two political terms - democratic state and totalitarian state - which will be used rather frequently by us. Between the two World Wars, Britain and France might be regarded as democratic states. Within these two states, the individuals had freedom of speech and of the press, of petition and of assembly, and freedom from arrest for political opinions. They could form political parties and elect the party or the parties they liked to rule. In short, the individual was an end in himself. The government helped to provide for the fullest development and security of all individuals. Russia (1917-1939), Italy (1922-1939) and Germany (1933-1939) might be regarded as mean totalitarian states. Within these states, the individuals had no right of free speech, free publications and free associations. The individuals had no right to form political parties. There was only one governmental party which imposed its dictatorial rule on the people. This one-party regime was concerned with the 'total' activities of its people - their work, their leisure, their religion, even their private lives. The basic concept of the totalitarian state was best expressed in Mussolini's well-known phrase, "all within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state." In short, the state was the master, the individual the servant.
'Communism has ceased to exist in Bengal'Rediff - 3 hours ago A lot is being said about the Congress-Trinamool Congress alliance in West Bengal. While your detractors ridicule it as a marriage of convenience, ... Women on the warpath Express Buzz EC: highest allotment of forces for West BengalHindu - 20 hours ago KOLKATA: West Bengal will have the highest allotment of the Central forces during the 2009 Lok Sabha polls , Election Commissioner VS Sampath said here on ... Mega central squad for BengalTimes of India - 15 hours ago KOLKATA: West Bengal will get 220 companies of central forces the highest among all states in the country for the three-phase Lok Sabha elections. ... Troop promise after terror slur Calcutta Telegraph Naxals call for a vote boycott in Lalgarh Economic Times Vote boycott call may work in CPM's favour The Statesman A lama in the frayHindu - 20 hours ago Phetook Tshering Bhutia, being the eldest son in his family, was initiated into the monastic life, a tradition in some families with links to the monastery. ... Advani campaigns in Bengal, Sonia in DelhiIBNLive.com - 8 hours ago ... while the party's prime ministerial candidate LK Advani will address public meeting in Howrah, Bada Saab and Krishna Nagar districts of West Bengal. ... Sonia targets BJP over terrorism issue Little About Left Front running dictatorship in West Bengal: Sonia GandhiHindustan Times - Apr 27, 2009 Assailing West Bengal's Left Front (LF) government for "running a dictatorship", Congress president Sonia Gandhi Monday expressed concern at the Communist ... Sonia, Mamata close the gap, go after Left Expressindia.com Chair closer, gap closes Calcutta Telegraph Sonia Gandhi joins Mamata Banerjee in West Bengal; slams Left Front BreakingNewsOnline. GJM leaflet puts BJP is a tight spotTimes of India - 15 hours ago KOLKATA/JALPAIGURI/DARJEELING: If you thought Darjeeling is a part of Bengal, it's time to unlearn that. A Hindi pamphlet, issued by the Gorkha Janmukti ... BJP promises Gorkhaland for votes IBNLive.com Playing with fire The Statesman BJP cashes in on Gorkhaland issue The National Tribal voter mood in North Bengal leaves parties guessingEconomic Times - 1 hour ago JALPAIGURI: Tribal voters, numbering around 7.5 lakh, are set to play a key role in the four Lok Sabha seats in North Bengal. These are Alipurduar ... Brinda returns Sonia barbTimes of India - 14 hours ago MALDA: Reacting to Sonia Gandhi's comments against the Left Front government in Bengal the day before, Brinda Karat tore into the Congress at rallies in ... Brinda flays Sonia Merinews Swine flu alert across BengalCalcutta Telegraph - 18 hours ago April 28: Bengal today issued a statewide swine flu alert and decided to quarantine anyone coming from North America, Europe and Mexico with symptoms of the ... |
CPI(M) Madurai candidate hospitalisedHindu - Apr 28, 2009 Madurai (PTI): In a setback to AIADMK-led front ahead of the May 13 Lok Sabha polls, CPI(M) candidate for Madurai constituency P Mohan, pitted against DMK ... CPI-M candidate in Madurai falls ill, unable to campaign Thaindian.com Lok Sabha MP as PM: Focus on issues, not individuals Economic Times Another step to bury Bofors case: CPI(M)Hindu - 20 hours ago NEW DELHI: The Communist Party of India (Marxist) on Tuesday said the withdrawal of the Interpol red corner notice against Italian businessman Ottavio ... BJP, Left take on govt on Q affair The Statesman Ottavio out of Interpol wanted list Assam Tribune Life term for 8 CPI(M) activists in RSS worker murder caseHindu - Apr 28, 2009 Kannur (PTI): Eight CPI(M) workers were on Tuesday sentenced to life imprisonment by a fast track court for murdering an RSS activist in 2002 in the ... New Independent may lift CPI-M to powerThe Statesman - 19 hours ago RAIGANJ, April 28: The CPI-M this year is pretty certain that it will win the Raiganj Lok Sabha seat, courtesy of Mr Abdul Karim Choudhury. ... ‘Will go to jail if found guilty'The Statesman - 19 hours ago In New Delhi, the CPI-M has welcomed the Supreme Court's directive to the Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the role of the Mr Modi, and his Cabinet ... CPI (M) to contest Nurmahal assembly bye-electionBusiness Standard - 6 hours ago CPI(M) has decided to contest the bye-poll on Nurmahal Assembly segment and in a couple of days, name of the candidate would be announced, HS Minhas, ... CPI-M Sends Feelers to Nitish, Lalu, PaswanPatna Daily - 12 hours ago Communist Party of India – Marxist (CPI-M) politburo member Sitaram Yechuri, at a press conference in Patna on Tuesday said the third front was not averse ... CPI(M) for reworking Indo-US nuclear deal: KaratPress Trust of India - 4 hours ago New Delhi, Apr 29 (PTI) CPI(M), which led the Left parties in withdraw support to the UPA government on the Indo-US nuclear deal, now says it has "some ... |
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Lecture 10The Age of Totalitarianism: Stalin and Hitler | |
The Age of Anxiety, the age of the lost generation, was also an age in which modern Fascism and Totalitarianism made their appearance on the historical stage. By 1939, liberal democracies in Britain, France, Scandinavia and Switzerland were realities. But elsewhere across Europe, various kinds of dictators reared their ugly heads. Dictatorship seemed to be the wave of the future. It also seemed to be the wave of the present. After all, hadn't Mussolini proclaimed that this century would be a century of the right? Of Fascism? And this is what bothered such writers as Arthur Koestler (1905-1983), Yevgeny Zamyatin (1884-1937), Aldous Huxley (1894-1963), Karel Capek (1890-1938) and George Orwell (1903-1950). It was a nightmare world in which human individuality was subsumed under the might of totalitarian collectivism. The modern totalitarian state rejected liberal values and exercised total control over the lives of its subjects. In this way, totalitarianism became a new POLITICAL RELIGION for the Age of Anxiety. How this indeed occurred is the subject of this lecture. It goes without saying that the governments of Europe had been conservative and anti-democratic throughout their long histories. The leaders of such governments -- whether monarch or autocrat -- WERE the government, and by their very nature, prevented any incidence of social or political change that might endanger the existing social order. Of course, there have been enlightened monarchs but few of them would have been so enlightened to have removed themselves from the sinews of power. Before the 19th century these monarchs legitimized their rule by recourse to the divine right theory of kingship, an idea which itself appeared in medieval Europe. Such was the case in France until the late 18th century when French revolutionaries decided to end the Bourbon claim to the throne by divine right by cutting off the head of Louis XVI. Of course, France ended up with Napoleon who also claimed the divine right of kingship. Only this time, divine right emanated from Napoleon himself. In a country such as England, on the other hand, twenty years of civil war in the 17th century as well as the Glorious Revolution of 1688, produced a constitutional monarchy. In the 19th century, it was the dual revolution -- the Industrial and French Revolutions -- which created the forces of social change which monarchs, enlightened or not, could not fail to take heed. A large middle class had made its appearance in the 18th century but lacked status. Now, in the 19th century, this large class of entrepreneurs, factory owners, civil servants, teachers, lawyers, doctors, merchants and other professionals wanted their voices heard by their governments. They became a force which had to be reckoned with and the government began to utilize its talents by creating large, obedient bureaucracies. In this way, government seemed to reflect the interests of all when in actual fact, they represented the interests of the bourgeoisie. So European governments maintained order by giving the middle classes a stake in the welfare of the nation. Governments also built strong police forces and armies of loyal soldiers. Meanwhile, the great mass of people, the "swinish multitude," lay completely unrepresented. And radicals were either imprisoned or exiled because of their liberal, democratic, socialist, communist or anarchist inclinations. Despite these measures, and there were others as well, traditional authoritarian governments were not completely successful. Their power and their objectives were limited. These governments lacked modern communications and modern transportation. They lacked, in other words, the ability to totally control their subject populations. The twentieth century -- thanks to improved technology -- would change all that. In fact, it can be said that true totalitarian regimes are limited only by the extent to which mass communications have been made a reality. And, of course, with mass communications comes mass man, and the capability of total control. Following World War One, there was a revival of traditional authoritarian regimes, especially in Eastern Europe. By 1938, of all the central and eastern European countries, only Czechoslovakia remained true to liberal political ideals. It has been remarked that the reason for this development was the perception that liberal democracy was a failure. It was not "made" for Eastern European nations. These nations lacked a tradition of self-government but they did have lengthy traditions of ethnic conflict as well as a steady growth in nationalism. As agrarian nations, the large landowners and the Church opposed any efforts at land reform. These countries also contained a small and relatively weak middle class. In a way, the 18th century seemed to have ignored these countries. Finally, for nations such as Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Austria and Estonia, it was the Great Depression that dashed any hopes for a liberal government based on the western model. Although many of these central and eastern European countries would adopt fascist characteristics, their general aim in doing so was not to become fascist themselves. Instead, their aim was to maintain the established order. They wanted to avoid revolution and more important, they wanted to avoid another world war. Modern totalitarian regimes made their appearance with the total effort required by the Great War. The reason for this is quite simple -- war required all institutions to subordinate their interests to one objective at all costs: victory. The individual had to make sacrifices and so their freedoms, whatever they might have been, were constantly reduced by increasing government intervention. The invisible hand of Adam Smith had to be replaced by the visible hand. Governments could not longer remain idle hoping that some "laissez-faire" mentality would carry them through the day. No. Governments had to intervene and the great event which made this notion of intervention a necessity, was the Great War. Beyond this, the crucial experience of World War I was Lenin, the Bolsheviks and the Russian Civil War. Lenin had shown how a dedicated minority -- the Bolsheviks -- could make a dedicated effort and achieve victory over a majority. This was as true of the Revolution as much as it was of the Civil War when the Bolsheviks overcame the White Army who were numerically superior. Lenin also clearly demonstrated how institutions and human rights might be subordinated to the needs of a single party and a single leader. So, Lenin provided a model for a single party dictatorship, i.e. the Bolsheviks. It was Lenin, who provide the model for Stalin as well as Hitler and Mussolini. Totalitarian regimes -- thanks to technology and mass communications -- take over control of every facet of the individual's life. Everything is subject to control -- the economy, politics, religion, culture, philosophy, science, history and sport. Thought itself becomes both a form of social control as well as a method of social control. Those of you familiar with Orwell's premonitionary novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four, should have an easy time understanding this development. The totalitarian state was based on boundless dynamism. Totalitarian society was a fully mobilized society, a society constantly moving toward some goal. Which begs the question: Is democracy the means to an end or the end itself? Paradoxically, the totalitarian state never reached its ultimate goal. However, it gave the illusion of doing so. As soon as one goal was reached, it was replaced by another. Such was the case in Stalin's Russia. Stalin implemented a series of Five Year Plans in an effort to build up the industrial might of the Soviet Union. Production quotas were constantly announced well before they had been reached in order to supply the illusion that the Five Year Plan was working. But before the Five Year Plan had run its course, another Five Year Plan was announced. Hopefully, you can intuit the psychological necessity of such an act on Stalin's part.
However, Stalinist society did have its frightening aspects and none was more frightening than the existence of brutal, unrestrained police terrorism. First used against the wealthy peasants or kulaks during the 1920s and 1930s, terror was increasingly used against party members, administrators and ordinary people. No one would ever be above suspicion -- except Stalin, of course. Some were victims of terror for deviating from the party line -- others were victims for no apparent reason other than Stalin's moodiness. One Soviet recalled that in 1931, "we all trembled because there was no way of getting out of it. Even a Communist can be caught. To avoid trouble became an exception." As we now know, Stalin's second wife also publicly rebuked Stalin for the destruction the terror famine was working and she committed suicide in 1932. And on December 1, 1934, Sergei Kirov, the man who in some circles was rumored to be Stalin's heir, was assassinated in Leningrad on Stalin's orders. Using Kirov's death as an excuse, Stalin systematically purged the Communist Party of his opponents. Hundreds of party members were shot for their alleged complicity in Kirov's death. Kirov was a full member of the ruling Politburo and leader of the Leningrad party apparatus as well as an influential member of the ruling elite. His overt concern for the welfare of the Leningrad workers and his skill as an orator earned him considerable popularity. It is doubtful that Kirov represented a serious threat to Stalin, however, Kirov did disagree with Stalin on several key issues. But Stalin had already begun to doubt the loyalty of the Leningrad party and he looked for a pretext to begin a broad purge. The murder of Kirov was necessary. Although it was Leonid Nikolaev who committed the assassination, it is now clear that the whole episode had been, over a period of two years, crafted by Stalin and the NKVD. Stalin, of course, then used the crime as an excuse to introduce severe laws against all political crimes. So, following the death of Kirov at the end of 1934, there began the Soviet witch-hunt which culminated in the Great Terror of the years 1935-1939. In 1936, Stalin brought his old comrades Zinoviev and Kamenev to a staged public trial. An international press corps was invited to lend a sense of legitimacy to the proceedings. When their trial had ended Zinoviev, Kamenev and fourteen other old Bolsheviks either admitted involvement in the Kirov Affair or signed confessions that had been fabricated for them. These men had not been conspirators but they did satisfy Stalin's paranoia. As to be expected, they were all executed. The confessional process was helped by the black jack, continuous interrogation and the swan dive, where towelling was put between the jaws and the feet and tightened, arching and breaking the back. But often, the confession was voluntary because the Party demanded it. As one survivor recalled, "serving the party was not just a goal in life but an inner need." In January 1937 a second great show trial was held in which seventeen leading Bolsheviks declared that they had knowledge of a conspiracy between Trotsky and the German and Japanese intelligence services by which Soviet territory was to be transferred to Germany and Japan. A crowd of 200,000 packed Red Square in frigid weather to hear Nikita Khrushchev read out the death sentences. All seventeen were executed. Then on June 11, 1937, the cream of the Red Army, stripped of their medals and insignia, were ushered into the courtroom. They included Marshal Tukhachevsky, the most brilliant soldier of his generation and the pioneer of armored and airborne warfare. The generals were accused of spying for the Germans, found guilty, shot and dumped in a trench on a construction site, all within eighteen hours. Six of the officers who condemned them were soon shot. Of 85 corps commanders 57 disappeared within a year. Of the 100,000 Red Army officers on active duty in 1937, perhaps 60,000 were purged. The last of the public trials took place in March 1938, as twenty-one leading Bolsheviks, including Nikolai Bukharin (1888-1938), confessed to similar charges and were executed. Also to go was Yagoda, Stalin's hand-picked head of the NKVD. These public show trials and the secret trials of the generals provide only a faint idea of the extent of the Great Terror. Every member of Lenin's Politburo except Stalin and Trotsky were either killed or committed suicide to avoid execution. A partial list of those who ceased to exist would include:
Not since the days of the Inquisition had the test of ideological loyalty been applied to so many people. And not since the days of the French Revolution had so many died for failing the test. Arrests multiplied tenfold in 1936 and 1937. Anything was used as an excuse for an arrest: dancing too long with a Japanese diplomat, not clapping loudly enough or long enough after one of Stalin's speeches, buying groceries from a former kulak. People went to work one day and simply did not return -- they were either killed immediately or sent to the GULAG. The NKVD employed millions of secret informers who infiltrated every workplace. Most academics and writers came to expect arrest, exile and prison as part of their lives. A historian could be sent to exile for describing Joan of Arc as nervous and tense just when the general party line wished her described as calm in the face of death. When a linguistic theory that held that all language was derived from four sounds was accepted as official, professors who opposed this view had their books confiscated. By 1938 at least one million people were in prison, some 8.5 million had been arrested and sent to the GULAG and nearly 800,000 had been executed. In fact, before the KGB was dissolved in 1991, it was revealed that 47 million Soviet citizens had died as a result of forced collectivization and the purges. That figure, of course, represents the recorded tally. How many more people died without being recorded is a matter of conjecture. There is no doubt in anyone's mind that Stalin wanted to destroy any possibility of future conspiracies. So he trumped up charges against anyone who could conceivably become a member of a regime that might make the attempt to replace his own. He did this to maintain his power. He also did this, as his biographers are quick to point out, because he was paranoid. Despite the upheaval of the constant purge trials, the Soviet state did not break down. New bureaucrats were found to replace the old. New Stalin-trained officials filled all top-level posts and terror became one of the principal features of the government itself. In the end, the purgers were also purged. They were the scapegoats used by Stalin to carry out the Great Terror. Meanwhile, Trotsky had been out of Russia for years but he continued to use his pen to attack Stalin in his journal, The Bulletin of the Opposition. In Stalin's eyes, Trotsky could not be left free. Stalin's purges baffled nearly all foreign observers. He saw threats everywhere. Were they real? Leading Communists confessed to crimes against the State they never committed. Some were brainwashed, others tortured. Still others, like Nikolai Bukharin, were shot in the head. And eventually, even Trotsky was murdered in Mexico City in 1940, an ice pick to the head. Soviet life in the 1930s, purge trials aside, was one of constant propaganda and indoctrination. Party members lectured to workers in factories and peasants in the field. Newspapers, films and radio broadcast endless socialist achievements and capitalist evil. Art, literature, film and science were politicized -- sovietized. The intellectual elite of the 1930s were ordered by Stalin to become "engineers of human souls" or, as Maxim Gorky put it, the "CRAFTSMEN OF CULTURE." Russian nationalism had to be glorified. Capitalism was portrayed as the greatest of evils. Ivan the Terrible and Peter the Great were resurrected and depicted as the forerunners of Stalin. History had to be rewritten. "Who controls the past, controls the future; who controls the present controls the past," wrote Orwell. Stalin rarely appeared in public but his presence was everywhere: portraits, statues, books, films and quotations from his idiotic books surrounded the Soviet man and woman. Life was hard inside Soviet Russia and the standard of living declined in the 1930s, despite Stalin's claim that the Five Year Plans had modernized the nation. Black bread and shabby clothes came to represent the Russian masses. There were constant shortages of food although heavily taxed vodka was always available. Housing was poor and in short supply. Although life was hard, the Soviet people were by no means hopeless. The average Russian saw himself heroically building the world's first socialist society while capitalism was crumbling in the west. On the positive side, the Soviet worker received social benefits such as old age pensions, free medical services, free education and even day care facilities. Unemployment was technically non-existent and there was the possibility of personal advancement. The key to advancement was specialized skills and a technical education. Rapid industrialization under the Five Year Plans required massive numbers of experts, technocrats, skilled workers, engineers and managers. So the State provided economic incentives for those people who would faithfully serve the needs of the State. But for the unskilled, low wages were the rule. But, the State dangled high salaries and special housing to those members of the growing technical and managerial elite. This elite joined forces with the "engineers of the human mind" to produce a new social class -- and all this in a supposedly classless society. Stalin's ego mania and paranoia eventually contributed to the near destruction of Soviet Russia. His perpetual and pathological lying and deception, culminating in the infamous purge trials of the 1930s, took the Soviet Union down a road out of which it is now slowly recovering, if, in fact, it ever will recover. I am reminded of the political history of the Roman Empire following the death of Augustus Caesar in 14 A.D. First Caligula, then Nero, Commodus, Severus and so on -- 250 years of military assassinations, strangulations and poisoning. In the 1770s, Edward Gibbon sat down to complete his major work of historical scholarship, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. In it, he says, "The story of Rome's ruin is simple and obvious and instead of inquiring why the Roman Empire was destroyed we should rather be surprised that it had subsided for so long.... The stupendous fabric yielded to the pressure of its own weight." Now, I don't mean to take the position that Soviet Russia was identical to the Roman Empire, but I do think that we should be surprised that Stalinist Russia existed for so long. In retrospect, however, we should acknowledge the terror, criminality and totalitarian regime of Joseph Stalin. This is indeed what Nikita Khrushchev did in his SECRET SPEECH of 1956, three years after Stalin's death. Despite all that has been said, popular memory reveals that of all the totalitarian regimes of the 20th century, none was more terrifying than that of Nazi Germany. As a product of Hitler, Germany's social and political situation, and the general attack on liberalism, Nazi Germany emerged rapidly after 1933 when Hitler came to power. The Nazis smashed all independent organizations, mobilized the economy and began the systematic extermination of the Jewish and other non-German populations. The story of Hitler is well-known -- there is an entire Hitler industry of book publishing these days, unmatched only by books on the JFK assassination. Why this might be the case is rather obvious. Hitler seemed to be evil incarnate. So too was Stalin. But then again, the west did not fight a war, not a hot one, at least, against Stalin. We also have more information regarding the Nazis than we do Stalin, whose regime was always clouded in secrecy. The Nazis, on the other hand, kept good records. In his now classic work, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, William Shirer mentions that in 1945 the U.S. First Army seized 485 tons of records of the German Foreign Office in the Harz Mountains as they were about to be burned on orders from Berlin. Such a figure, it must be added, represents only part of the whole. Hitler was born in Austria in 1889 (for more on Hitler, see Lecture 9). He dropped out of school at age 14 and then spent four years as a tramp before he left his home for Vienna to become an artist. He applied to the Imperial Academy of Fine Arts and was denied admission. He was told he had no artistic talent. Back on the streets, the tramp Hitler began to absorb a nationalist ideology. In Vienna he discovered that the Germans were a superior race of people and the natural masters of the inferior races of Europe. He also learned his anti-Semitism, racism and hatred of all Slavic people. An ex-monk by the name of Lanz von Liebenfels inspired Hitler's twisted Darwinism. Liebenfels stressed the superiority of the Germans, the inevitability of racial conflict and the inferiority of the Jews. The master race, by its very nature, had to grow. Selective breeding and the systematic sterilization of inferior races was the answer. When war broke out in 1914, Hitler believed he had found salvation. The struggle and discipline of war gave meaning to Hitler's life. Life was struggle and so too was war. What better atmosphere for Hitler to further develop his nationalist and social Darwinist sentiments. But when defeat came in 1918, Hitler's world was shattered. The war had been his reason for living. What could have happened? Well, for Hitler, the Jews and Marxists had stabbed Germany in the back. Therefore, these parasitic intellectuals ought to be removed. Back home following the war, Hitler began to make wild speeches to small audiences in the streets. He didn't care if many people heard him out, only that he could articulate his message of anti-Semitism and German nationalism. And people did listen to Hitler. And they began to take seriously what he gesticulated on the streets. By 1921, Hitler had become the leader of a small but growing political party. It is interesting to note that Hitler shared very little of the interests of this party, instead, he simply took it over because he needed a party of his own. The German Workers' Party denounced all Jews, Marxists and liberals. They promised national socialism. They used propaganda and theatrical rallies. They wore special badges and uniforms and as they marched, robotlike, through the streets of Münich, they rendered their special salute. Most effective of all their tools was the mass rally -- a rally made for mass man. Songs were sung, slogans were cast about. It was a revivalist movement, or at least it had the atmosphere of a religious revival. Hitler was a charismatic speaker and easily worked his audiences up into a frenzy. Party membership began to grow. In 1923, Hitler launched a plot to march on Münich, a plot that eventually failed and sent Hitler to prison for five years. At his trial, Hitler presented his own program to solve Germany's problems. The audience listened and he began to attract their attention. He dared utter what everyone knew all along but were afraid to express. A new wave of converts began to side with the German Workers' Party. While in prison, Hitler wrote Mein Kampf. Its basic themes were German racial superiority, virulent anti-Semitism, the concept of Lebensraum, or living space, pan-Germanism and the necessity of yet another war. The Nazis now had their Bible. By 1928, the Nazi Party now had 100,000 members and Hitler had absolute control. The Nazis were still a marginal political group but world events in 1929 and 1930 produced a new mania for the Hitler program. Unemployment stood at 1.3 million in 1929. The following year, it had risen to 5 million while industrial production in 1932 fell by more than 50%. In that same year, 43% of all Germans were unemployed. Hitler now began to promise Germany economic salvation as well as military and political restitution for the "war guilt clause" specified at Versailles. He focused on the middle and lower middle classes---the office workers, civil servants and teachers. These were the people who had barely survived through the period of wild inflation following World War One. These were the people who were begging for salvation. The Nazis also made their appeal to GERMAN YOUTH. Hitler and his aides were, in general, much younger than other leading politicians. In 1931, for instance, 40% of all Nazis were under thirty years of age, 70% were under 40. This is quite different from what we would find in Stalinist Russia at the same time. National recovery, rapid change and personal advancement formed the main appeal of the Nazi Party. By 1932, Hitler had gained the support of key people in the army and in big business. These individuals thought they could use Hitler for their own financial interests. So, they accepted Hitler's demand to join the government only if he became Chancellor. Since the government was a coalition consisting of two Nazis and nine conservatives, they reasoned that Hitler could be used and controlled. And so, on January 30th, 1933, Hitler legally became the Chancellor of Germany. Hitler moved quickly to establish a dictatorship. He used terror to gain power while maintaining an air of legality throughout. He called for new elections to Parliament and then had the Parliament building burned to the ground. He blamed the Communists for this act thus helping to get them out of the way and out of any possible public following. He convinced President Hindenburg to sign an emergency act that [1] abolished the freedom of speech and [2] abolished the freedom of assembly. On March 23, 1933, the Nazis pushed the Enabling Act through Parliament, thus making Hitler dictator for a period of four years. Communist Party members were arrested, the Catholic Center Party withdrew all opposition and the Social Democratic Party was dissolved. So it was that Germany, like Soviet Russia under Stalin, became a one party State. In the economic sphere, all strikes were made illegal and unions were abolished. The members of professional organizations such as doctors, lawyers, professors and engineers were swallowed up in Nazi-based organizations. In the cultural sphere, the press now feel under total state control. Blacklisting became the rule, books were burned, modern art was prohibited and anti-intellectualism became the rule of the day. Hitler promised the German people work and bread and he delivered both. As most shrewd politicians are capable, Hitler gave the people what they wanted the most. He launched a massive public works program to pull Germany out of the Depression. Superhighways, office buildings, huge stadiums and public buildings were constructed at a rapid pace. By 1936, however, government spending was now being directed almost entirely to the military, necessary for the coming war Hitler had already specified in Mein Kampf. Meanwhile, unemployment dropped steadily. In January 1937, unemployment stood at 7 million. Twelve months later it had fallen to 1 million and by 1938, Germany witnessed a shortage of labor. The standard of living increased by 20% and business profits were finally increasing. What all this recovery showed was that Hitler was more than show -- he was no Mussolini who made the trains run on time. No, Hitler had accomplished something for Germany and the German people. For those Germans who were not Jews, Slavs, Gypsies or communists, liberals, non-Germans, or insane or weak, Hitler's government meant greater opportunity and greater equality. Older class barriers were replaced by individuals who, like Hitler, were rootless and had risen to the top. The Nazis tolerated privilege and wealth, but only when it served the Party. Big business was constantly ordered around thus making, once again, the invisible hand of Adam Smith, a thing of the past. Of course, you can identify a similar tendency in the United States with the New Deal and Stalin's Five Year Plans in Soviet Russia. Planning was, in other words, essential. Although economic recovery and increased opportunity won Hitler support, Nazism was totally guided by two main ideas: Lebensraum and race. As Germany regained economic strength and built up its military, Hitler formed alliances with other dictators and began to expand. Meanwhile, western Europe simply sat back and tried to appease Hitler in order to avoid another World War. War did break out in 1939 for one specific reason -- Hitler's ambitions were without limit. The Nazi armies scored impressive victories until late in 1942. Hitler's aggression was so strong that a mighty coalition of nations was needed to destroy his growing empire. By the summer of 1943, the tide had turned and two years later, Germany lay in ruins, utterly defeated. The one thousand year Reich was decidedly short-lived. The Second World War marked the climax of the Age of Anxiety. Stalin's Russia and Hitler's Germany rejected all liberal ideas. They tried to subordinate everything to the State. Basic human rights were subjected to brutality and to terror. Whereas Stalin, however, was content to extend his control over the Soviet Union, it was Hitler who aimed at unlimited territorial and racial aggression of a master race. Hitler made war inevitable: first with France, then with Britain and Russia and ultimately with the United States. | The History Guide | Feedback | copyright © 2000 Steven Kreis |
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Totalitarianism
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Totalitarianism (or totalitarian rule) is a concept used to describe political systems whereby a state regulates nearly every aspect of public and private life. Totalitarian regimes or movements maintain themselves in political power by means of an official all-embracing ideology and propaganda disseminated through the state-controlled mass media, a single party that controls the state, personality cults, control over the economy, regulation and restriction of free discussion and criticism, the use of mass surveillance, and widespread use of state terrorism.
[edit] Etymology
The notion of Totalitarianism as "total" political power by state was formulated in 1923 by Giovanni Amendola who criticized Italian Fascism as a system fundamentally different from conventional dictatorships.[2] The term was later assigned a positive meaning in the writings of Giovanni Gentile, Italy’s most prominent philosopher and leading theorist of fascism. He used the term “totalitario” to refer to the structure and goals of the new state. The new state was to provide the “total representation of the nation and total guidance of national goals.”[3] He described totalitarianism as a society in which the ideology of the state had influence, if not power, over most of its citizens.[4] According to Benito Mussolini, this system politicizes everything spiritual and human:[2] The concept of totalitarianism emerged in the 1920's and 1930's, although it is frequently and mistakenly seen as developing only after 1945 as part of anti-Soviet propaganda during the cold war.
| “ | Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state. | ” |
[edit] Difference between authoritarian and totalitarian states
According to Karl Loewenstein, "the term 'Authoritarian' denotes a political organization in which the single power holder - an individual person or 'dictator', an assembly, a committee, a junta, or a party monopolizes political power. The term 'Authoritarian' refers rather to the structure of government than to the structure of society. An Authoritarian regime confines itself to political control of the state.
"The governmental techniques of a totalitarian regime are necessarily Authoritarian. But a totalitarian regime does much more. It attempts to mold the private life, soul, and morals of citizens to a dominant ideology. The officially proclaimed ideology penetrates into every nook and cranny of society; its ambition is total.
"Totalitarian regimes seek to destroy civil society i.e. communities that operate independently of the State. Neither the Italian fascists nor the Nazis completely 'destroyed their respective social structures', and so these countries 'could rapidly return to normalcy' after defeat in World War II. In contrast, attempts to reform the regime in the USSR 'led to nowhere because every non-governmental institution, whether social or economic, had to be built from scratch. The result was neither reform of Communism nor establishment of democracy, but a progressive breakdown of organized life'".[2]
In a comment about the similarity of religion to totalitarianism Christopher Hitchens has said "the urge to ban and censor books, silence dissenters, condemn outsiders, invade the private sphere, and invoke an exclusive salvation is the very essence of the totalitarian".[5]
[edit] Examples of the term's use
One of the first to use the term "totalitarianism" in the English language was the Austrian writer Franz Borkenau in his 1938 book The Communist International, in which he commented that more united the Soviet and German dictatorships than divided them.[6] Isabel Paterson, in The God of the Machine (1943), used the term in connection with the collectivist societies of the Soviet Union and National Socialist Germany. During a 1945 lecture series entitled The Soviet Impact on the Western World (published as a book in 1946), the pro-Soviet British historian E. H. Carr claimed that "The trend away from individualism and towards totalitarianism is everywhere unmistakable", and that Marxism was much the most successful type of totalitarianism, as proved by Soviet industrial growth and the Red Army's role in defeating Germany. Only the "blind and incurable" could ignore the trend towards totalitarianism, said Carr.[7]
Sir Karl Popper, in The Open Society and Its Enemies (1945) and The Poverty of Historicism (1961), articulated an influential critique of totalitarianism: in both works, he contrasted the "open society" of liberal democracy with totalitarianism, and argued that the latter is grounded in the belief that history moves toward an immutable future, in accordance with knowable laws.
In The Origins of Totalitarianism, Hannah Arendt argued that Nazi and Communist regimes were new forms of government, and not merely updated versions of the old tyrannies. According to Arendt, the source of the mass appeal of totalitarian regimes is their ideology, which provides a comforting, single answer to the mysteries of the past, present, and future. For Nazism, all history is the history of racial struggle; and, for Marxism, all history is the history of class struggle. Once that premise is accepted, all actions of the regime could be justified by appeal to Nature or the Law of History.[8]
Scholars such as Lawrence Aronsen, Richard Pipes, Leopold Labedz, Franz Borkenau, Walter Laqueur, Sir Karl Popper, Eckhard Jesse, Leonard Schapiro, Adam Ulam, Richard Löwenthal, Hannah Arendt, Robert Conquest, Karl Dietrich Bracher, Carl Joachim Friedrich and Juan Linz describe totalitarianism in slightly different ways. They all agree, however, that totalitarianism seeks to mobilize entire populations in support of an official state ideology, and is intolerant of activities which are not directed towards the goals of the state, entailing repression or state control of business, labour unions, churches or political parties.
[edit] Cold War-era research
The political scientists Carl Friedrich and Zbigniew Brzezinski were primarily responsible for expanding the usage of the term in university social science and professional research, reformulating it as a paradigm for the communist Soviet Union as well as fascist regimes. For Friedrich and Brzezinski, the defining elements were intended to be taken as a mutually supportive organic entity composed of the following: an elaborating guiding ideology; a single mass party, typically led by a dictator; a system of terror; a monopoly of the means of communication and physical force; and central direction and control of the economy through state planning. Such regimes had initial origins in the chaos that followed in the wake of World War I, at which point the sophistication of modern weapons and communications enabled totalitarian movements to consolidate power.
The German historian Karl Dietrich Bracher, whose work is primarily concerned with National Socialist Germany, argues that the "totalitarian typology" as developed by Friedrich and Brzezinski is an excessively inflexible model, and failed to consider the “revolutionary dynamic” that Bracher asserts is at the heart of totalitarianism.[9] Bracher maintains that the essence of totalitarianism is the total claim to control and remake all aspects of society combined with an all-embracing ideology, the value on authoritarian leadership, and the pretence of the common identity of state and society, which distinguished the totalitarian "closed" understanding of politics from the "open" democratic understanding.[10] Unlike the Friedrich-Brzezinski definition Bracher argued that totalitarian regimes did not require a single leader and could function with a collective leadership, which led the American historian Walter Laqueur to argue that Bracher's definition seemed to fit reality better then the Friedrich-Brzezinski definition.[11]
Eric Hoffer in his book The True Believer argues that mass movements like Communism, Fascism and Nazism had a common trait in picturing Western democracies and their values as decadent, with people "too soft, too pleasure-loving and too selfish" to sacrifice for a higher cause, which for them implies an inner moral and biological decay. He further claims that those movements offered the prospect of a glorious future to frustrated people, enabling them to find a refuge from the lack of personal accomplishments in their individual existence. Individual is then assimilated into a compact collective body and "fact-proof screens from reality" are established.[12]
[edit] Criticism and recent work with the concept
In the social sciences, the approach of Friedrich and Brzezinski came under criticism from scholars who argued that the Soviet system, both as a political and as a social entity, was in fact better understood in terms of interest groups, competing elites, or even in class terms (using the concept of the nomenklatura as a vehicle for a new ruling class).[13] These critics pointed to evidence of popular support for the regime and widespread dispersion of power, at least in the implementation of policy, among sectoral and regional authorities. For some followers of this 'pluralist' approach, this was evidence of the ability of the regime to adapt to include new demands. However, proponents of the totalitarian model claimed that the failure of the system to survive showed not only its inability to adapt but the mere formality of supposed popular participation.
The notion of "post-totalitarianism" was first put forward by the German political scientist Richard Löwenthal, who argued that the Soviet Union in the years after Stalin’s death in 1953 saw the emergence of a system Löwenthal called variously "authoritarian bureaucratic oligarchy" or “post-totalitarian authoritarianism”.[14] Writing in 1960, Löwenthal contended the development of “post-totalitarianism” in the Soviet Union and its satellites in Eastern Europe meant "Those countries have not gone from tyranny to freedom, but from massive terror to a rule of meanness, ensuring stability at the risk of stagnation".[14] Afterwards, the theory of "post-totalitarianism" was expanded upon by political scientist Juan Linz. For certain commentators, such as Linz and Alfred Stepan, the Soviet Union entered a new phase after the abandonment of mass terror upon Stalin's death. Discussion of "post-totalitarianism" featured prominently in debates about the reformability and durability of the Soviet system in comparative politics.
From a historical angle, the totalitarian concept has been criticized. Historians of the Nazi period inclined towards a functionalist interpretation of the Third Reich such as Martin Broszat, Hans Mommsen and Ian Kershaw have been very hostile or lukewarm towards the totalitarianism concept, arguing that the Nazi regime was far too disorganized to be considered as totalitarian.[15] In the field of Soviet history, the concept has disparaged by the "revisionist" school, a group of mostly American left-wing historians, some of whose more prominent members are Sheila Fitzpatrick, Jerry F. Hough, William McCagg, Robert W. Thurston, and J. Arch Getty.[16] Through their individual interpretations differ, the revisionists have argued that the Soviet state under Stalin was institutionally weak, that the level of terror was much exaggerated, and that to the extent it occurred, it reflected the weaknesses rather the strengths of the Soviet state.[16] Fitzpatrick argued that since to the extent that there was terror in the Soviet Union, since it provided for increased social mobility, and thus far from being a terrorized society, most people in the Soviet Union supported Stalin's purges as a chance for a better life.[17] Writing in 1987, Walter Laqueur commented that the revisionists in the field of Soviet history were guilty of confusing popularity with morality, and of making highly embarrassing and not very convincing arguments against the concept of the Soviet Union as totalitarian state.[18] Laqueur argued the revisionists' arguments with regards to Soviet history were highly similar to the arguments made by Ernst Nolte in regards to German history.[18] Laqueur asserted that concepts such as modernization were inadequate tools for explaining Soviet history while totalitarianism was not.[19]
[edit] Totalitarian Regimes
François Furet used the term "totalitarian twins"[20] in an attempt to link Stalinism[21] and Fascism.[22] Ernst Nolte challenged the linkage that Furet proposed.
Gary M. Grobman wrote:
- Totalitarian regimes, in contrast to a dictatorship, establish complete political, social, and cultural control over their subjects, and are usually headed by a charismatic leader. Fascism is a form of right-wing totalitarianism which emphasizes the subordination of the individual to advance the interests of the state.[23]
Michael Parenti both acknowledged and criticized the linkage:
- Both the Italian fascists and the Nazis consciously tried to imitate the left: youth organizations, mass mobilizations, rallies, parades, banners, symbols, slogans, uniforms. And I think for this reason, too, many mainstream writers treat fascism and communism as totalitarian twins. But most workers and peasants could tell the difference. Industrialists and bankers could tell the difference. And certainly the communists and the fascists could tell the difference.[24]
Daniel Singer wrote:
Central to Furet's argument is the belief that in a Europe shaken by World War I, Communism and Fascism were propping each other up. While the totalitarian nature of Stalin's Russia is undeniable, I find the thesis of "totalitarian twins" both wrong and unproductive. To sustain it, Furet is bound to twist facts. Though he recognizes that Mussolini reached power through a compromise with traditional elites and that Hitler had the backing of big business, the author hotly denies that Fascism and Nazism could be rotten products of capitalism. The Nazi-Soviet pact is for him perfect proof of complicity between the two systems, but the Munich agreement--for which he has all sorts of justifications--is nothing of the sort.
[edit] In popular culture
According to Soviet writer Fazil Iskander[25],
| “ | Under the totalitarian regime, it was as if you were forced to live in the same room with a violently insane man. | ” |
—Fazil Iskander | ||
George Orwell's books Nineteen Eighty-Four as well as "Animal Farm" are famous for their depiction of a totalitarian society, as is its lesser-known predecessor, We by Yevgeny Zamyatin.
[edit] See also
This entry is related to, but not included in the Political ideologies series or one of its sub-series. Other related articles can be found at the Politics Portal.- Authoritarianism
- Carceral state
- Dictatorship
- Legalism (Chinese philosophy)
- Fascism
- Nazism
- Police state
- Single-party state
- Stalinism
- Taisei Yokusankai
- Total institution
- Totalism
- Totalitarian democracy
[edit] Notes
- ^ See, for example,
- Cover of the book The Dictators by Richard Overy, ISBN 071399309X
- Cover of the book Hitler, Stalin, and Mussolini: Totalitarianism in the Twentieth Century by Bruce F. Pauley, ISBN 088295993X
- Cover of a political cartoon collection Hitler, Staline et compagnie by André Girard, ISBN 2283020271
- An illustration in the New York Times by Lou Beach (December 26, 2004) [1]
- Cartoon Wonder how long the honeymoon will last? by Clifford K. Berryman (October 9, 1939) [2][3]
- Cover of the book The Dictators by Richard Overy, ISBN 071399309X
- ^ a b c Pipes 1995, p. 240-281
- ^ Stanley G. Payne, Fascism: Comparison and Definition (UW Press, 1980), p. 73
- ^ G. Gentile & B. Mussolini in "La dottrina del fascismo" 1932)
- ^ Hitchens, Christopher God is not great:how religion poisons everything Hachette Book Group USA, 2007, Page 234
- ^ Nemoianu, Virgil, Review of End and Beginnings pages 1235-1238 from MLN, Volume 97, Issue # 5, December 1982, p.1235.
- ^ Laqueur, Walter, The Fate of the Revolution, New York: Scribner, 1987, p.131.
- ^ Dana Richard Villa (2000), The Cambridge Companion to Hannah Arendt. Cambridge University Press, p.2-3. ISBN 0521645719
- ^ Kershaw, Ian The Nazi Dictatorship: Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation, London: Arnold; New York page 25.
- ^ Kershaw, Ian The Nazi Dictatorship: Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation, London: Arnold; New York page 25.
- ^ Laqueur, Walter The Fate of the Revolution: Interpretations of Soviet history from 1917 to the Present, New York: Scribner's, 1987 page 241
- ^ Eric Hoffer, The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements, Harper Perennial Modern Classics (2002), ISBN 0060505915, p.61, 163
- ^ Laqueur, Walter The Fate of the Revolution: Interpretations of Soviet history from 1917 to the Present, New York: Scribner's, 1987 pages 186-189 & 233-234
- ^ a b Laqueur, Walter The Fate of the Revolution: Interpretations of Soviet history from 1917 to the Present, New York: Scribner's, 1987 page 243
- ^ Lorenz, Chris "Broszat, Martin" pages 143-144 from The Encyclopedia of Historians and Historical Writing, Volume 1, edited by Kelly Boyd, London: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 1999 page 143; Kerhsaw, Ian The Nazi Dictatorship Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation, London: Arnold Press, 2000 pages 45-46; Menke, Martin "Mommsen, Hans" pages 826-827 from The Encyclopedia of Historians and Historical Writing edited by Kelly Boyd, Volume 2, London: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishing, 1999
- ^ a b Laqueur, Walter The Fate of the Revolution: Interpretations of Soviet history from 1917 to the Present, New York: Scribner's, 1987 pages 225-227
- ^ Laqueur, Walter The Fate of the Revolution: Interpretations of Soviet history from 1917 to the Present, New York: Scribner's, 1987 pages 225 & 228
- ^ a b Laqueur, Walter The Fate of the Revolution: Interpretations of Soviet history from 1917 to the Present, New York: Scribner's, 1987 page 228
- ^ Laqueur, Walter The Fate of the Revolution: Interpretations of Soviet history from 1917 to the Present, New York: Scribner's, 1987 page 233
- ^ "Furet, borrowing from Hannah Arendt, describes Bolsheviks and Nazis as totalitarian twins, conflicting yet united." (Daniel Singer, The Nation - April 17, 1995)
- ^ "The totalitarian nature of Stalin's Russia is undeniable." (Daniel Singer)
- ^ "The government of Nazi Germany was a fascist, totalitarian state." (Gary M. Grobman)
- ^ http://www.remember.org/guide/Facts.root.nazi.html
- ^ http://sonic.net/~doretk/ArchiveARCHIVE/M%20P/Parenti%20on%20Fascism.html
- ^ Robert Conquest Reflections on a Ravaged Century (2000) ISBN 0-393-04818-7, page 189
[edit] References
- Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (1958, new ed. 1966)
- John A. Armstrong, The Politics of Totalitarianism (New York: Random House, 1961)
- Franz Borkenau The Totalitarian Enemy, London, Faber and Faber 1940
- Karl Dietrich Bracher “The Disputed Concept of Totalitarianism,” pages 11-33 from Totalitarianism Reconsidered edited by Ernest A. Menze (Port Washington, N.Y. / London: Kennikat Press, 1981), ISBN 0804692688.
- Michel Foucault, The Birth of Biopolitics (in particular March 7, 1979 course)
- Carl Friedrich and Z. K. Brzezinski, Totalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy (2nd edn 1967)
- Zheliu Zhelev, The Fascism, 1982
- Guy Hermet with Pierre Hassner and Jacques Rupnik, Totalitarismes (Paris: Éditions Economica, 1984)
- Abbott Gleason Totalitarianism : The Inner History Of The Cold War, New York: Oxford University Press, (1995), ISBN 0195050177
- Jeane Kirkpatrick, Dictatorships and Double Standards: Rationalism and reason in politics (1982)
- Walter Laqueur The Fate of the Revolution Interpretations of Soviet History From 1917 to the Present, London: Collier Books, (1987) ISBN 0-02-034080-X.
- Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan, Problems Of Democratic Transition And Consolidation: Southern Europe, South America, And Post-Communist Europe, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, (1996), ISBN 0801851572.
- Ludwig von Mises, Omnipotent Government: The Rise of the Total State and Total War (1944)
- Ewan Murray, Shut Up: Tale of Totalitarianism (2005)
- Stanley G. Payne, A History of Fascism (Routledge, 1996)
- Pipes, Richard (1995), Russia Under the Bolshevik Regime, New York: Vintage Books, Random House Inc., ISBN 0-394-50242-6 .
- Giovanni Sartori, The Theory of Democracy Revisited (Chatham, N.J: Chatham House, 1987)
- Wolfgang Sauer, "National Socialism: totalitarianism or fascism?" pages 404-424 from The American Historical Review, Volume 73, Issue #2, December 1967.
- Leonard Schapiro, Totalitarianism (London: The Pall Mall Press, 1972)
- J. L. Talmon, The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy, (1952)
- Slavoj Zizek, Did Somebody Say Totalitarianism? (London: Verso, 2001)
[edit] External links
 | Look up totalitarianism in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
- Totalitarianism - Article on the origin and meaning of the term; gives many 20th century examples and contrasts with Authoritarianism
- FAES Totalitarism and Human Nature: How and Why Communism Failed
- Dictatorship Watch, putting totalitarianism in perspective
- Oracle ThinkQuest Library definition
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http://www.haindavakeralam.com/HkPage.aspx?PAGEID=6733&SKIN=C |
Professor Chakravarthi, in the article of the previous post estimates the total number of middle Indians to be close to 200 million. I have a slightly different way of looking at the middle class, which is more social and cultural than simply economic. I look at the middle-class as sort of a semi-exclusive club, where the key requirement for entry is knowledge of English. As per the Census of 1991, about 11 % of India’s population knew English, extrapolating this percentage based on certain plausible assumptions1, I would estimate that number to be about 16-18 % today. Another way of looking at things is observing the % age of population that receives a tertiary education, given that the number is roughly around 11-12 % today, it would also a give a number in the same ball park. All in all, we can definitely say that knowledge of English, tertiary education and consumption potential must correlate strongly in India today. The number in any case should lie in between 150-200 million.
Understanding middle India’s relationship with English is crucial. Knowledge of English, together with mass media and the internet puts middle India in a very interesting position. It is in some sense, ‘pre-western’. The combination of comfort with English, combined with the relatively liberal political and media environment of India, is resulting in a huge American influence on this middle class. Also contributing are the increasingly strong people to people links between America and India2. The middle class is thus developing aspirations that are in line with this psuedo-western mindset. It seems that for now these aspirations are mostly consumerish and professional, not political.
But why not ? So much is wrong with India’s politics. What explains this most unforgivable disengagement ? Many different reasons have been proposed, but I think it really starts in school. Although the syllabus is now much better, when I was in school I mostly learnt about the Freedom Struggle, Shivaji and the Maratha Empire. I learnt a lot about what the results of the Freedom Struggle should have been and how a democratic India should be run. But I learnt absolutely nothing about what happened in the 50 odd years of a supposedly ‘free’ India. My textbooks were silent on the Emergency, the Babri Masjid demolition, problems in Punjab, Kashmir and the North East. They were silent on the day to day corruption. They did a very bad job of making me an Indian citizen. Add to this, the traditional nepotistic and self-serving attitudes of most Indians meant that we choose ambitions/aspirations with little regard to what effect our life will have on the broader society we are part of.
So in India today, we have a generation of young men and women who ‘dream’ of Harvard, neuro-surgery, nano-technology and New York, but there are few signs of environmental lawyers, quality journalists and film-makers, professors with India-specific research interests and politicians from the middle class. The entire nation seems in decay, institutions that are the fundamentals of the nation are collapsing, because the young blood that would have nourished them is now either in America doing a PhD in Computer Science or working in a tech company in Bangalore. For now it seems, middle India has abandoned the Republic.
But the middle class has its own fears, of course. Entry to this club is tough, and membership is not permanent. Life although easier than that of an Orissa tribal or a Bihari farmer is no cakewalk for most of middle India. But, the middle class has to realize one thing, that migration is an okay goal for an individual3, but not for an entire society. Until this fundamental realization occurs and middle India learns that it has a huge stake in the well being of the rest of India around it, India will be on a path that leads nowhere. It has to learn that the Dayamani Barlas command as much respect and recognition as the Abhinav Bindras. It has to organize and ensure that government schemes like the NREGA are implemented as faithfully as possible instead of drowning them in their cynicism. The middle class has to assert itself politically, it can start of by simply rejecting all criminal politicians, regardless of party affiliation. Most of all, it has to stop waiting for a political messiah. No one person galvanize a Kashmiri, a Mizo and a Malayali, that is not what this Union is about.
1: The literacy rate in 1991 was about 50 %, and was around 65 % in 2001. So we can conjecture that it will be around 80 % in 2011 census (probably more due to SSA). And assuming that the same ratio of literates speak English as in 1991 we get a number close to 17 %.
2: This blog being one example. One can find numerous other blogs of Indian grad students and young professionals in the US.
3: Some groups have to migrate, either due to security reasons or because some professions can only be pursued abroad.
"Enhanced Interrogation Technique"Atlantic Online - Apr 28, 2009 Consider for instance some comfortable English professor defending Russian totalitarianism. He cannot say outright, "I believe in killing off your opponents ... Teetering PakistanNational Journal - Apr 27, 2009 If allowed to continue to go unchecked, Pakistan's current, continued drift into anarchy, disorder and religious totalitarianism ensures that the next 9/11 ... Mental slavesThe Statesman - Apr 22, 2009 Disguised as “internationalists”, they threw their lot behind Mao's violent totalitarianism and supported China's war against India in 1962. ... From Parties in Plenty to Alliances GaloreRadiance Viewsweekly - Apr 12, 2009 SOROOR AHMED discusses the changing phases of democracy in India and says that instead of parties it is now the alliances which are breaking and then ... Mystical diplomacyTimes of India - Apr 18, 2009 This conflict might have already arrived in India. “The fundamentalists are trying to undermine Sufis. Even in India, some groups, funded by the Saudis, ... The Economics Of Turning People Into ThingsCounterCurrents.org - Apr 21, 2009 The new members such as China, India, and Brazil are welcomed into the fold at a critical time. Their co-operation is needed on issues of climate change, ... Mark Steyn: Who will lead the 'post-American era'?OCRegister - Apr 25, 2009 India? No, to the entire world! To listen to her, you'd think Pakistan was as scary as l'il Jimmy in the second grade's mom's SUV. ... JOHAN JAAFFAR: They shaped the world but never existedNew Straits Times - Apr 24, 2009 One fictional character that has truly defined the concept of totalitarianism and tyranny is Big Brother. In fact, it has become part of the English lexicon ... Global Warming Alarmists Looking At Literally Slaughtering Sacred ...KXMC - Apr 11, 2009 Which makes it the perfect vehicle for totalitarianism, doesn't it? If everything we do aids in the coming climate change apocalypse, then the government ... The Weekend WebtheTrumpet.com - Apr 26, 2009 Plus, Britain's slide toward totalitarianism. By Joel Hilliker and Stephen Flurry President Obama is prepared to begin sacrificing America's nuclear arsenal ... |
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