Common questions about Totalitarianism

Short answers, pulled from the story.

Who first defined the term totalitarianism in 1923?

The anti-fascist academic Giovanni Amendola was the first Italian public intellectual to define and describe Totalitarianism as a regime of government wherein the supreme leader personally exercises total power. This definition was quickly co-opted by the Fascists themselves, with the theoretician Giovanni Gentile ascribing politically positive meanings to the ideological terms totalitarianism and totalitarian in defense of Duce Mussolini's legal, illegal, and legalistic social engineering of Italy.

When did Winston Churchill use the word totalitarian in a speech to the House of Commons?

The label totalitarian was twice affixed to Nazi Germany during Winston Churchill's speech of the 5th of October 1938 before the House of Commons, in opposition to the Munich Agreement, by which France and Great Britain consented to Nazi Germany's annexation of the Sudetenland. Churchill was then a backbencher MP representing the Epping constituency.

What years did Benito Mussolini lead Fascist Italy as a totalitarian state?

As the Duce leading the Italian people to the future, Benito Mussolini said that his dictatorial régime of government made Fascist Italy from 1922 to 1943 the representative Totalitarian State. The term totalitarian became used by the Fascists themselves, and the theoretician of Italian Fascism Giovanni Gentile ascribed politically positive meanings to the ideological terms totalitarianism and totalitarian in defense of Duce Mussolini's legal, illegal, and legalistic social engineering of Italy.

Why did the concept of totalitarianism become abandoned in 1941?

The concept was abandoned in 1941, as the Third Reich invaded the USSR, and the latter became depicted in Western propaganda as valiant freedom-loving ally in the war. Among the major productions of pro-Stalinist Western propaganda was the film Mission to Moscow in 1943, based on the 1941 book of the same name.

Which historians argued that the Soviet Union was not a totalitarian state?

Historians like Hans Mommsen and Ian Kershaw were critical of concepts of totalitarianism and focused on lack of bureaucratic coherence in the Nazi system and on its immanent tendency towards self-destruction. The historian Robert Service in his biography of Stalin wrote that this was not a totalitarian dictatorship as conventionally defined because Stalin lacked the capacity, even at the height of his power, to secure automatic universal compliance with his wishes.

Read the full story about Totalitarianism →