Talk:Totalitarianism/Archive 2

message: There are currently two main differences to deal with, as the remainder may come down to style. The definition in terms of typology is clearly the standout, and there is also the more minor issue of the basic proviso to paragraph 3. Last things first. The bald proposition that the involvement of the military and captains of industry in the political process may mean that totalitarian regimes are not "truly" totalitarian must have a rider. Something which acknowledges that the mere involvement of elites in the political process does not mean that we are not dealing with a totalitarian regime. The very lack of internal and external transparency also illustrates that a "monolithic" appearance is telling in itself. Ok, typologies. How does having the meaning defined in terms of "ideal types" assist the general readership and the overall aims of the project (also note WP:Lead)? Why should anyone need to read and understand independent subject matter in order to digest the definition? Can we please have the comments of others on this point so that we achieve consensus? 172, may we both hold off on further edits on this point until a consensus is reached. Obey 04:28, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The rewrite and more on "typologies" 

message: specify. what would be the significance other than some "bad guy" no longer being premier
I have no idea what sort of argument you are attempting to attribute to me here.  The typical distinction made in Soviet policy occurs either immediately upon Stalin's death or after Khrushchev's speech in 1956 (or specifically the release of many gulag prisoners and so on).  I don't see that the distinction is particularly necessary to make here, so it is simply shorted to "after the premiership of Stalin", which is literally true in any such case.  --TJive 06:06, July 14, 2005 (UTC)
:i agree with 172 on this point. the shift in the Soviet Union from totalitarianism to authoritarianism (though there are plenty that would still call post-Stalin era totalitarian despite lack of terror) is based on the fact that Khrushchev ended the deification of the Communist leadership and stopped mass terror. it should be specified. J. Parker Stone 06:10, 14 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Good explanation, Trey. I'd add that the formal office of "premier" was ridiculously insignificant compared to Stalin's personal direction of the secret police, which he employed to subvert state and party to his personal terror. 172 06:18, 14 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Premiership 

message: I'm surprised to see no mention of Karl Popper on this page. -- Jmabel | Talk 06:19, 25 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I thought he was mentioned. Please go ahead and mention him, if you can and I don't get around to it first. Good job noticing that. 172 | Talk 15:56, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Popper 

message: This article should be about what important academics and politicians call "totalitarian" societies. Whether these take the form of states or regimes - and whether the term "totalitarianism" refers to an ideology or a degree of control should of course be mentioned in the article, particularly if there is some dispute about this.
If there are writers and others (outside of Wikipedia) who object to the marriage of fascism and communism, let's say so in the article. Who opposes the definition of "totalitarianism" which lumps Hitler and Stalin together? Supporters of Stalin, maybe? Fine: say so in the article.
:As JMabel and I have already told you, Kirpatrick is not the only one who lumped Hitler and Stalin together. The term "totalitarianism" in Western political science was largely based on the work of Arendt and Brzezinski, which too sought to explain both the development of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia. 172 | Talk 08:44, 1 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I am not imposing my own ideas. Speaking of which, I am going to revert the unilateral moving of the article. (It's obvious that we're dealing with states when we're dealing with totalitarianism. So adding "states" to the title is extraneous.) The term typology or idea type in political science and sociology refers to a conceptual model that serves as a way to circumscribe research. An ideal type is a historical approximation, not a perfect statement of reality, meant to simplify the endless matters when something could otherwise be described by the endless array of related information. This is not my POV. No political scientist would dispute that totalitarianism is a typology. If this is unclear to me, do not assume what you did not know earlier is "probably nonsense." Instead, go to Jstor, a database of academic journals online and do a search for reworks "totalitarian model," "typology," "and totalitarianism" and confirm it for yourself. 172 | Talk 08:44, 1 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Excuse me, 172, Brzezinski was a relative latecomer to this, too. Popper was publishing The Open Society and Its Enemies when Brzezinski was starting college. -- Jmabel | Talk 06:55, 2 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, but he was probably the leading figure in promoting the usage of the "totalitarian model" in Soviet studies in the U.S. political science. His model was dominant in scholarship on Russia until the late 1960s. So he has always been more influential in the academic literature than Kirkpatrick. 172 | Talk 08:08, 2 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. -- Jmabel | Talk 06:06, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

text: The text was confusing. I changed the text to state that Friedrich and Brzezinski were primarily responsible for establishing the term as a paradigm for social science research of the Soviet Union. They did make very influential contributions in the sense that they help set the first dominant research agenda in Soviet studies. 172 | Talk 00:09, 6 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Stick to the point 

message: This article lists some references, but gives no indication which facts are cited to which references. Some of the purported references look very unlikely to me. George Orwell's, 1984 is a work of fiction, and is not explicitly mentioned in the article, so how could it have been a reference? Joost A. M. Meerloo, M.D, The Rape of the Mind available on line appears to be a book on brainwashing, not particularly on totalitarianism: for what, precisely is it a reference? Similarly, while we treat the views of J. L. Talmon's The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy at totalitarian democracy, his views are hardly mainstream. For what was he used as a reference? -- Jmabel | Talk 02:45, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  References 

message: In a series of revisions, I removed, User:Obey restored, and then I removed again this sentence in the intro commenting on criticisms of the explanatory power of the concept of totalitarianism: "Others respond that the very absence of transparency and the existence of an oligarchy tend to imply the existence of a totalitarian state." I have no idea who's making this 'response.' I'm pretty familiar with the academic literature on the subject; so I doubt that I'm simply unfamiliar with a common argument, which the sentence is purportedly representing. Moreover, simply put, I doubt that it's a argument put forward by a specialist because it is hopelessly incoherent. The "the very absence of transparency and the existence of an oligarchy" does not "imply" totalitarianism. Elements of "oligarchy"-- an ancient concept dating back to Aristotle-- are not exclusive to any one type of political system. The sentence is likely (bad) "original research."
I urge other editors to be vigilant of the insertion of original research here. This article, like many articles on politics in Wikipedia, can be a magnet for original research because people are often familiar with political concepts, and have strong opinions on them, while not being too familiar with scholarly definitions of terms. 172 | Talk 09:52, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If you are going to contribute to Wikipedia, you will have to expect critical feedback on your work. If another editor points out mistakes in your work, there is no need to be defensive. We all make mistakes. 172 | Talk 09:32, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

text: The term is a typology and must be discussed in terms of typologies. Since the time of the ancient Greeks political theorists have created typologies to decribe different political systems. Book VIII of Plato's Republic distinguishes a handfull of different types of states, including the oligarchic, tyrannical, and the democratic. Book IV of Aristotle's Politics undertakes a taxonomy of political systems distinguishing who rules and for whom. His taxonomy includes monarchy, aristocracy, polity, oligrarchy, and democracy. I can go on and on listing taxonomies through the history of political thought. Just about every major theorist, from Aristotle to Arendt, had his or her own taxonomy. There is an almost infinite range of ways political systems have been classified. In recent years, confronted by this vast array of understanding political forms, political scientists have attempted to classify and categorize, to develop typologies and models, or in some other way to bring analytic order to the vast array of different ways to describe political systems. "Totalitarianism" is one of these typologies. But it is used by some political scientists but not others. 172 | Talk 17:06, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Original research creep 

message: This article is for the well-educated layman, but should also be accessible to high-school and college students. Expressions like "ideal type" and "typology" obscure the discussion.
If the point of critics of the term is that it is WRONG to apply the term "totalitarianism" to regimes which these critics endorse - on the grounds that the term carries an unfairly negative connotation, then the article should simply register that objection. Many advocates of Communism bristle (or worse!) whenever parallels are drawn between the all-encompassing state control of everyday life in Communist regimes (like the USSR) and Fascist regimes (like Nazi Germany). Well, that's their Point Of View, and we should describe it.
The two most commonly heard points that writers (outside Wikipedia, I mean) assert about "totalitarianism" are:
*that the practice is bad
**that Communism and fascism are "totalitarian twins"
**people's lives should not be so closely controlled as the Soviets, Castro, Mao and Hitler attempted to do
*that the term unfairly lumps in Communism - or socialism, which is or can be a very good thing - with Fascism, which "as we all know" is a bad thing
Our challenge in this article is not to reconcile thest two points of view, and certainly not to endorse one over the other. We should describe each POV accurately and attribute it to its proponents. --Uncle Ed 13:32, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This article will not be dumbed down. If readers are unfamiliar with the term typology, they can click on the hyperlink. This is a wiki. And by the way, not to be arrogant-- I'm sure I know how to speak to the "well-educated layman" better than you. My job is to teach this stuff to teenagers. 172 | Talk 17:10, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Clarification and obscurity 

message: Hi there. A good faith heads up on the typology thing: I've RFCd again on the talk page. My self-evident agenda is to recast the definition primarily in something other than the non-accessible (as I say) "typologies". Is there room for compromise? If you're amenable, any suggestions? What about the second part of the lead of my last effort? Can that be redrafted so we have general definition first, immediately followed by a redrafted reference to typologies? Would you at least agree that an improved, self-contained definition is possible? Or do you feel that we must have "(T) is a typology employed by political scientists..."? I will also be tweaking that last paragraph on monoliths etc but I'm hoping that this will be less controversial. Constructive dialogue may yet work for us... Obey 09:53, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I refer you to my post earlier: The term is a typology and must be discussed in terms of typologies. Since the time of the ancient Greeks political theorists have created typologies to decribe different political systems. Book VIII of Plato's Republic distinguishes a handfull of different types of states, including the oligarchic, tyrannical, and the democratic. Book IV of Aristotle's Politics undertakes a taxonomy of political systems distinguishing who rules and for whom. His taxonomy includes monarchy, aristocracy, polity, oligrarchy, and democracy. I can go on and on listing taxonomies through the history of political thought. Just about every major theorist, from Aristotle to Arendt, had his or her own taxonomy. There is an almost infinite range of ways political systems have been classified. In recent years, confronted by this vast array of understanding political forms, political scientists have attempted to classify and categorize, to develop typologies and models, or in some other way to bring analytic order to the vast array of different ways to describe political systems. "Totalitarianism" is one of these typologies. But it is used by some political scientists but not others. 172 | Talk 17:06, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

text: totalitarianism remains a contested concept
I need to know what you mean by this. If you mean that the use of the term "totalitarianism" is contested, then we can all help each other (and our readers) by defining precisely how each of several various political scientists or other writers use the term.
If you mean that there is a debate over whether totalitarian regimes (i.e., all-encompassing, hyper-controlling dictatorships) are GOOD or BAD for the people, then you're on solid editorial ground. There is indeed a well-known and age-old debate over this very point, with dozens or hundreds of answers to the questions of how much control a state should exert over its people and which aspects of should come under its control.
Would you please help me and Obey by agreeing to separate the two questions?
#the definition of the term, its applicability to various types of regime, etc.
#the moral evaluation of the extent and degree of control a regime should exert
I'm sure we can work in the concept of "typology" somewhere! ;-) --Uncle Ed 13:39, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Giovanni Gentile, when describing the Mussolini regime, was the only major political theorist to use the term in a positive sense. The use of the term by other major political theorists and political scientists is negative. I mean that the term is contested in the sense that some political scientists use a different typology to describe a particular regime that another political scientist would describe as totalitarian. 172 | Talk 17:13, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Totalitarianism 

message: You wrote:
:totalitarianism remains a contested concept
I need to know what you mean by this. If you mean that the use of the term "totalitarianism" is contested, then we can all help each other (and our readers) by defining precisely how each of several various political scientists or other writers use the term.
If you mean that there is a debate over whether totalitarian regimes (i.e., all-encompassing, hyper-controlling dictatorships) are GOOD or BAD for the people, then you're on solid editorial ground. There is indeed a well-known and age-old debate over this very point, with dozens or hundreds of answers to the questions of how much control a state should exert over its people and which aspects of should come under its control.
Would you please help me and Obey by agreeing to separate the two questions?
#the definition of the term, its applicability to various types of regime, etc.
#the moral evaluation of the extent and degree of control a regime should exert
I'm sure we can work in the concept of "typology" somewhere! ;-) --Uncle Ed 13:39, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Giovanni Gentile, when describing the Mussolini regime, was the only major political theorist to use the term in a positive sense. The use of the term by other major political theorists and political scientists is negative. I mean that the term is contested in the sense that some political scientists use a different typology to describe a particular regime that another political scientist would describe as totalitarian. 172 | Talk 17:13, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  What the dispute is about 

message: 172, you cut the 2 sections above from your talk page with the comment that they belong here at talk:Totalitarianism (these posts belong on the article talk page ). I have pasted them, assuming (in good faith) that you meant to do so yourself. 
But your reversion of my edits lacks sufficient explanation. Please dialogue with us on the above points before proceeding further. --Uncle Ed 16:52, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Be patient. I am responding to both of you. 172 | Talk 17:06, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  No edit war 

message: The entire article seems like an argument for the point of view that:
*the term "totalitarianism" is a stupid, made-up term that doesn't refer to anything in the real world
There is very little information about totalitarian regimes, such as fascism under Mussolini and Hitler or Communism in many places. --Uncle Ed 20:06, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Needs balance 

message: For what it's worth, I find the current header that 172 put up, which does not discuss "means" until a later paragraph and documents the term more than the concept, to be a more encyclopedia-like coverage of the subject. --Improv 13:13, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  FWIW 

message: 172 reverted ALL my changes indiscriminately saying Not this again. User:Ed Poor, we already thoroughly discussed this matter in his edit summary. [] However, I have not had answers to any of my questions. He has merely responding by saying that he already answered me. I still don't understand why "typology" is so important as to require mention in the first sentence of the article. And I have other questions.
172, please discuss your large reversions before making them. --Uncle Ed 14:15, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  172's reversions 

message: I suggest we divide the article into parts describing those scholars or others who advocate the use of the term, from those who criticize the term as useless, easily misapplied, etc.
Before my current round of edits, the article seemed to be almost entirely focused on asserting that the terms "totalitarian" and "totalitarianism" are useless, impractical and (even hinted that they were) mere propanganda terms.
I'd like to get away from this hinting and marginalizations and get the real issue out in the open.
Some politicians and intellectuals (group #1) find the term useful. They apply it to the "totalitarian twins" of Fascism and Communism, finding several significant aspects in both types of dictatorship.
Labeling it a "typology" or "ideal type" in the first sentence supports the POV that group #1 is incorrect but without identifying the sources (group #2) who dispute the first group's point of view. (If the second group has only one member, i.e. user:172, then I'm not sure we should mention his views at all; but I assume good faith.)
Please help me balance the article between those who find "totalitarianism" a useful term (or concept) and those who (for whatever various reasons) do not. And please supply sources for all advocates of either point of view - don't simply "revert because we already discussed it or came to consensus" because this is a new point which has NOT been discussed yet. --Uncle Ed 14:41, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't understand your point. The article already does that because it centered around, as Improv states, "discussion over the term, where people apply it, and different meanings given to it." I think you're seeing a problem that isn't there because-- for some reason that I cannot understand for the life of me-- you think that the concept is being criticized when one recognizes that it is a typology like (say) Weber's three types of legitimate authority-- another useful concept. 172 | Talk 19:14, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Advocacy about term 

message: I read the intro to Ideal type again today, and accordingly modifed the intro to Totalitarianism. I suggest we review some major examples of countries labelled "totalitarian" and show (in the article) how they do and do not match the definition.
I suppose the reason that 172 kept reverting all my changes to his preferred version, was that he felt that without an early and prominent mention of the words "typology" or "ideal type", readers might get the impression that all governments deemed "totalitarian" were despotic to the same degree. Yugoslavia was not nearly as controlling as North Korea is, for example. And not every Fascist country had an Iron Curtain keeping people in and journalists out.
Dictatorships in general vary in the degree to which they suppress human rights, so the term "dictatorship" is also an typology or Ideal type which (like a shoe or a Procrustean bed) cannot really be made to fit each "person". That is, it's not always bad for a country to be a dictatorship; dictatorship can be benevolent. And it's not always "democratic" for a party or leader to win an election. Hitler came to power without actually staging a coup (a combination of election results and behind-the-scenes maneuvering), but no one considers Nazi Germany to have been "democratic".
There is much to put into the article. I hope nobody will revert to an old version, but go an and add whatever it currently lacks - or move things up or down within the article. Reverting to one's favorite old version merely impedes progress. Discussing problems and looking for mutually acceptable solutions is better. --Uncle Ed 14:57, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Degree to which a government may be considered totalitarian 

message: I just reviewed some of the earlier talk. 172 wrote:
:This sentence presupposes the historical reality of totalitarianism
Sorry if I'm taking this out of context. I don't meant to. Please correct me if I'm distorting your meaning, but...
It looks like you personally dispute the fact that totalitarianism has ever existed anywhere on the earth in modern times. If that is your POV, fine. Argue for it all you want. But not at Wikipedia. POV-pushing, as you know, is not permitted here. 
It would not be pushing your own POV, however, if you listed in the article instances in which published writers (other than yourself!) denied the "historical reality of totalitarianism" and balanced this with writers who assert its reality. 
In fact, if you don't believe in Wikipedia:Writing for the enemy, you don't have to supply the counter-examples that oppose the POV you cherish. You can just stand back and allow others to add them. Reverting all changes that you disagree with, back to one article version that you yourself wrote, would likely be seen as standing in the way of creating a balanced article. And that is what I'm asking you not to do.
I do not want to make Wikipedia take a stand favoring my own cherished point of view, if there is any kind of significant dispute about it. I helped to establish the NPOV guidelines. I know them backwards and forwards. I have never pushed a POV, even if I have through sloppiness failed to balance one with the other when editing quickly. I have always supported adding in the opposing POV when there is a dispute. 
Accusing me of POV-pushing is slanderous, and I wish everybody would just stop it. All I want is a balance of points of view. If 9 out of 10 sources deny "the historical reality of totalitarianism" then fine: let 90% of the article be about how totalitarianism never really existed and is only an "ideal type". But based on what I've seen so far in my life, it's closer to 50-50 than to 90-10 on that. If I'm wrong, then the intro should say that most scholars feel that "totalitarianism" is a typology which does not correspond to reality. --Uncle Ed 15:16, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, you are taking me out of context. You continue to fail to understand what typology means. A typology can be an extremely useful analytic tool in describing reality. There is no disputing the fact that the concept of totalitarianism is a typology. Refer to Improv's comments earlier. You seem to be repeating yourself every time you start a new discussion heading. Yet your points/confusions have been addressed over and over again. 172 | Talk 19:06, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The one thing you have never explained is why "totalitarianism" must be introduced as a "concept" while no other form of goverment needs this. Reverting ALL my changes to YOUR favorite version, instead of answering this, is silly. --Uncle Ed 19:11, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Improv already explained to you why totalitarianism is not a "form of government." Is the reason you keep starting new discussion headings over and over again because you are not interested in even bothering to read the replies that you have already received? 172 | Talk 19:57, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

text: Notice Improv's comments earlier: Your edits... have both made the article worse and introduced inaccuracies (Totalitarianism is a type of government? Not at all. It's a description people put on a number of radically different types of government). I ask that you Stop making new sections on the talk page to confuse the dialogue Go back and respond to some of the issues I and 172 have raised that are some sections back. 172 | Talk 20:00, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

text: This article lists forms of government and political systems, according to a series of different ways of categorising them. The systems listed are of course not mutually exclusive, and often have overlappping definitions (for example autocracy, despotism, totalitarianism, monarchy and tyranny). 
Are you trying to say something like the CONCEPT of gravity doesn't make things fall to the earth - while privately acknowledging that gravity DOES make it fall? If so, I don't understand why that's significant. Gravity pulls stuff toward the center of the earth. Newton discovered the law of gravitation. I suppose SOME readers might be interested in the distinction between the force itself and the law governing the force, but remember we have lay readers for our science articles. And we don't confuse them with highblown distinctions. --Uncle Ed 20:30, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Totalitarianism and reality 

message: Why is the first several paragraphs of the text commented out? I suspect this is part of a content duspute, but is this really necessary? it makes the article confusing to edit. Paul August ☎ 17:31, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Commented out text? 

message: I myself am neutral on whether (1) the word "totalitarianism" is a typology or (2) Totalitarianism is a form of government. 
*the rise of Nazi Germany and the catastrophic fate of European Jewry at its hands, the rise of Soviet Stalinism ... Arendt insisted that these manifestations of political evil could not be understood as mere extensions in scale or scope of already existing precedents, but rather that they represented a completely 'novel form of government', one built upon terror and ideological fiction. 
The bullet point above is the POV of Hannah Arendt.
Is there a published source which says the opposite, i.e., that totalitarianism is not a form of government? If so, we can quote that source! --Uncle Ed 18:14, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Typology vs. form of government 

message: Without disputing your revert of my edits, might I suggest that we incorporate the three edits following yours? Check out this diff and tell me whether you agree. I bet we all would agree with these minor changes. Cheers! :-) 
:Of course! Lapaz 18:54, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  How far to roll back 

message: Cut from article:
:In this sense, these regimes may exhibit pluralism through the involvement of several groups in the political process.
This needs a source. 172, did you write this? Being a college professor, surely you have a source at your fingertips. --Uncle Ed 20:59, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ed, don't you remember when I gave you the source for that line earlier!??? You're driving me nuts here! I'll add the cite to the article. 172 | Talk 03:17, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

text: I rm no source! That's not in my habits, not without any discussion at least. Lapaz 01:40, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pluralism 

message: 172 wrote:
:Ed Poor, may I please discuss Lapaz's changes with him, without having to go through you. I still have questions about the additions. Thanks. 
You don't have to 'go through me'. But the custom of Wikipedia is, as I'm sure you know, that instead of repeatedly reverting all of everyone else's changes to your own version, please discuss them on the talk page. This is a guideline, if not policy. 
For example, why must 'typology' be in the first sentence? Is it an assertion that totalitarianism doesn't exist, i.e., it's merely an Ideal type? And does this mean that you are asserting that there have never been any totalitarian states?
If it's the latter, you MUST allow the article to reflect the dispute between advocates who support, and who oppose, this POV. Otherwise, the article would be one-sided. --Uncle Ed 13:30, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unexplained reverts 

message: Please feel free to add to this list and to start a section to try to reach consensus on any of these issues.
* Whether to use the word "typology" in the lead sentence
* Whether to link to the article totalitarian regime
* Whether to mention and discuss The Black Book of Communism
* Whether to list single-party state and personality cult as characteristics of totalitarian regimes (deleted by 172)
* Whether to add a reference to this statement: "Critics of the concept contend that the term lacks explanatory power. They argue that governments which may be classified as totalitarian often lack characteristics said to be associated with the term. They may not be as monolithic as they appear from the outside, if they incorporate several groups, such as the army, political leaders, industrialists, which compete for power and influence" which would be: "See for example Hannah Arendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem, chapter IX on the Reich's deportations. Functionalists in particular have argued in favor of this thesis." (deleted by 172)
* Whether to include the sentence "Gentile ghostwrote Mussolini's Doctrine of Fascism (1931), which used the term "statolatry" (formed on idolatry) and "totalitarianism"." after "The term, employed in the writings of the philosopher Giovanni Gentile, was popularized in the 20th century by the Italian fascists under Benito Mussolini." in the first subsection (deleted by 172).
* Whether to try to start a section describing Hannah Arendt's thesis (IMO, the most famous and one of the first philosopher describing totalitarianism - see subsection below for proposed text)
* Whether to include as bibliographical references the following books: Bruno Rizzi, La Bureaucratisation du monde (The Bureaucratisation of the World) (1939) and Carl Schmitt, Die Diktatur (1928) (both deleted by 172)
* Economic totalitarianism. Whether to delete or not this article.
==== Hannah Arendt ? ====
Here's the proposed text deleted by 172:
"Hannah Arendt argued that while Italian fascism constituted a classical case of dictatorship, Nazism and Stalinism fundamentally differed from such forms of tyranny, in that the single-party state was completely subjected to the party, either a representative of the nation (conceived by Nazism as a Volksgemeinschaft - a Nazi neologism for "National community" -, which could only be achieved by gaining control of all aspects of cultural and social life - Gleichschaltung) or of the proletariat. To the contrary, according to Arendt's controversial thesis, Mussolini's fascism still respected the authority of the state on the party. Arendt also underlined the role of pan-Germanism and pan-Slavism in both Nazism and Stalinism, which she described as "continental imperialisms" whom connected themselves to the racist discourse born during the New Imperialism period. Hannah Arendt's thesis on the totalitarian identity between Nazism and stalinism has inspired a generation of thinkers, and has been also widely contested. It has been argued that fascism shared more traits with Nazism, including a common ideology, which set these two regimes apart from communist regimes such as the USSR."
* This strikes me as an accurate summary of Arendt's views; Arendt is one of the most important writers on the topic; what is the objection to restoring this? - Jmabel | Talk 04:05, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Obviously. I wasn't the one who wrote the passage on it, but it seemed reasonable. Lapaz 15:24, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Wow, a great catalogue of Nazi and capitalist attempts to discredit Communism. Sickening really...
-G —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 134.117.157.7 (talk) 22:04, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yea, like communism needed help being discredited, it did a great job doing it itself.  And what is the difference between communism and Nazism?  The Nazis had a slightly better fashion sense.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Amcalabrese (talk • contribs) 23:06, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

text: I'm not familiar with Rizzi, but he clearly is arguing a totalitarian similarity between Fascism & Stalinism. I'm more familiar with Carl Schmitt, who was a Nazi law theorist, who attempted to justify the Nazi rule in Die Diktatur. His work has recently been read against him by such people as Jacques Derrida, Giorgio Agamben, Antonio Negri, etc., and provides an important theoretical framework to understand totalitarian rule (see in particular Agamben's discussion of the "state of exception"). Lapaz 15:22, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

text: * So, if you are "not familiar with Rizzi", how can you say he "must be included"? - Jmabel | Talk 16:56, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Because I think that, seeing the time period, the person & the arguments, his views is pretty representative of a certain type of analysis of totalitarianism. It is no wonder that trotskyists were quick on putting together Stalinism & Nazism. However, if you — or others — feel it is biased to include him, I will certainly not argue much in favor of him — as I haven't read him, and certainly my point is not in arguing in favor of trotskyists! :) Lapaz 02:13, 30 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  List of issues in contention 

message: Here's the proposed text deleted by 172:
"Hannah Arendt argued that while Italian fascism constituted a classical case of dictatorship, Nazism and Stalinism fundamentally differed from such forms of tyranny, in that the single-party state was completely subjected to the party, either a representative of the nation (conceived by Nazism as a Volksgemeinschaft - a Nazi neologism for "National community" -, which could only be achieved by gaining control of all aspects of cultural and social life - Gleichschaltung) or of the proletariat. To the contrary, according to Arendt's controversial thesis, Mussolini's fascism still respected the authority of the state on the party. Arendt also underlined the role of pan-Germanism and pan-Slavism in both Nazism and Stalinism, which she described as "continental imperialisms" whom connected themselves to the racist discourse born during the New Imperialism period. Hannah Arendt's thesis on the totalitarian identity between Nazism and stalinism has inspired a generation of thinkers, and has been also widely contested. It has been argued that fascism shared more traits with Nazism, including a common ideology, which set these two regimes apart from communist regimes such as the USSR."
* This strikes me as an accurate summary of Arendt's views; Arendt is one of the most important writers on the topic; what is the objection to restoring this? - Jmabel | Talk 04:05, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hannah Arendt ? 

message: IMO not accurate enough for reasons explained above. Lapaz 20:43, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Typology 

message: IMO unnecessary. Better not to split the debate into two articles when we can't even agree in this one. Lapaz 20:43, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Link to [[totalitarian regime]] 

message: Definitively an important book written by serious historians. The thesis is controversial but has lit a huge debate. Lapaz 20:43, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Obviously. I wasn't the one who wrote the passage on it, but it seemed reasonable. Lapaz 15:24, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Wow, a great catalogue of Nazi and capitalist attempts to discredit Communism. Sickening really...
-G —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 134.117.157.7 (talk) 22:04, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yea, like communism needed help being discredited, it did a great job doing it itself.  And what is the difference between communism and Nazism?  The Nazis had a slightly better fashion sense.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Amcalabrese (talk • contribs) 23:06, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Black Book of Communism]] 

message: Obvious characteristic of totalitarianism. Must be included. Lapaz 20:43, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Single-party state]] 

message: Obvious characteristic of totalitarianism. Must be included. Lapaz 20:43, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Personality cult]] 

message: The inventor of the term. Must be included. Here is the passage contested by 172, may be improved if he want, but the theme should be dealt with. "Gentile ghostwrote Mussolini's Doctrine of Fascism (1931), which used the term "statolatry" (formed on idolatry) and "totalitarianism"." after "The term, employed in the writings of the philosopher Giovanni Gentile, was popularized in the 20th century by the Italian fascists under Benito Mussolini." in the first subsection. Lapaz 20:43, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Gentile and [[statolatry]] 

message: Bruno Rizzi, La Bureaucratisation du monde (The Bureaucratisation of the World) (1939) and Carl Schmitt, Die Diktatur (1928) Must be included. Please provide rationale for excluding them. Lapaz 20:43, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not familiar with Rizzi, but he clearly is arguing a totalitarian similarity between Fascism & Stalinism. I'm more familiar with Carl Schmitt, who was a Nazi law theorist, who attempted to justify the Nazi rule in Die Diktatur. His work has recently been read against him by such people as Jacques Derrida, Giorgio Agamben, Antonio Negri, etc., and provides an important theoretical framework to understand totalitarian rule (see in particular Agamben's discussion of the "state of exception"). Lapaz 15:22, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: * So, if you are "not familiar with Rizzi", how can you say he "must be included"? - Jmabel | Talk 16:56, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Because I think that, seeing the time period, the person & the arguments, his views is pretty representative of a certain type of analysis of totalitarianism. It is no wonder that trotskyists were quick on putting together Stalinism & Nazism. However, if you — or others — feel it is biased to include him, I will certainly not argue much in favor of him — as I haven't read him, and certainly my point is not in arguing in favor of trotskyists! :) Lapaz 02:13, 30 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bibliographical references 

message: This article has been listed for deletion but was kept. If it exists, it obviously should be linked to from here. But shouldn't it be merged here? The concept is unheard of in scholarly circles. Lapaz 20:55, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Economic totalitarianism]] 

message: Could the former racist Apartheid regime of South Africa have qualified as a totalitarian state, at least in view of its regulation of the lives of non-white peoples (always the majority)?
Arguments for:
1. The Nationalist Party may not have been the only Party in racist South Africa, but it was the only one that had meaningful power. The African National Congress, which would have represented most citizens of South Africa, was outlawed. Such other parties as existed were best described as 'minor' parties utterly ineffective in achieving anything. South Africa under Apartheid was in practice a single-party state in the sense that the DDR was before 1989.
2. Although white people had extensive freedom, they were the only ones who could vote, and they were the only ones with meaningful freedom and security of property or vocational choice. Non-whites were subject to numerous regulations of personal life, especially the infamous Pass Laws that regulated where they could be at any time. Non-whites could never supervise whites irrespective of the level of skill. Although white people had security of property, non-whites (example: the Cape Coloured) had none. When it became fashionable for people to own seaside property, Coloureds were forced to sell out cheaply to whites. Apartheid
was inconsistent with laissez-faire economics.  
3. The government, and not old custom or personal violence, was the enforcer of such measures, in part through a secret police (BOSS, similar in some respects to the KGB). This fact distinguishes the Apartheid system from Jim Crow practices of the southern United States before 1965, practices that Americans of African origin could escape with relative ease. 
4. The government had a clear and consistent ideology backing its practices and a will to promote that ideology elsewhere.
5. It denied the right to vote to people on grounds of ethnicity. 
6. The demise of the system was seen by non-whites in much the same manner as was the demise of communism was.
The qualifications are, of course, that Apartheid was not restrictive against whites (except in prohibiting sexual relations with non-whites), so if the system was totalitarian toward the black majority it was not so clearly totalitarian toward whites, and that it allowed freedom of religion.  --66.231.41.57 02:32, 3 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think this is really a stretch. If you can find citable sources describing the apartheid regime as "totalitarian", I suppose that would be worth mentioning in the article, but this as your own extrapolation it certainly does not belong there. - Jmabel | Talk 08:16, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Again, it is not a matter of whether "one can" but whether reliable sources do. - Jmabel | Talk 06:26, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Possibly germane: Hannah Arendt (The Origins of Totalitarianism, 1966, p. 308–9). "…even Mussolini, who was so fond of the term 'totalitarian state', did not attempt to establish a full-fledged totalitarian regime and contented himself with dictatorship and one-party rule. Similar non-totalitarian dictatorships sprang up in pre-war Romania, Poland, the Baltic States, Hungary, Portugal and Franco's Spain." They then go on to discuss the forces in Italy and elsewhere that frustrated totalitarian ambitions. (quoted in Robert Bideleux and Ian Jeffries, A History of Eastern Europe: Crisis and Change, Routledge, 1998, ISBN 0-415-1611-8, p. 474.) - Jmabel | Talk 21:26, 27 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Apartheid]] 

message: Chomsky is an anarchist opposed to all forms of authority-if anyone has proof of his lack of 'distain' for totalitarianism, I'd be interested to see it. In the mean time, I've removed this risible smear.Felix-felix 08:02, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This article needs closer watching. The Chomsky smear came in this recent series of edits.  The other edits in the series were just as unhelpful as the Chomsky smear. 172 | Talk 08:21, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chomsky 

message: Another unhelpful edit-reversing the meaning of the original passage(Totalitarian regimes are intolerant of activities which are not directed towards the goals of the state, such as involvement with labour unions, churches or political parties.),by the addition of the word 'opposing' in front of labour with no evidence offered. Not only was this edit totally evidence free, but is also untrue (Solidarity springs to mind) and misleading. A little difficult to not view it as another malicious edit. I hope I'm wrong, of course.FelixFelix talk 07:38, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Opposing Labour Unions 

message: Substituted at 20:54, 4 May 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Assessment comment