Sign-In
Cart
The Psychology of Totalitarianism
Hardcover
General Political ScienceGeneral PsychologySocial Movements
Publisher Price: $28.00
ISBN13: 9781645021728
Publisher: Chelsea Green Pub
Published: Jun 23 2022
Pages: 240
Weight: 1.05
Height: 0.93 Width: 6.27 Depth: 9.19
Language: English
The world is in the grips of mass formation--a dangerous, collective type of hypnosis--as we bear witness to loneliness, free-floating anxiety, and fear giving way to censorship, loss of privacy, and surrendered freedoms. It is all spurred by a singular, focused crisis narrative that forbids dissident views and relies on destructive groupthink.
Desmet's work on mass formation theory was brought to the world's attention on The Joe Rogan Experience and in major alternative news outlets around the globe. Read this book to get beyond the sound bites!
Totalitarianism is not a coincidence and does not form in a vacuum. It arises from a collective psychosis that has followed a predictable script throughout history, its formation gaining strength and speed with each generation--from the Jacobins to the Nazis and Stalinists--as technology advances. Governments, mass media, and other mechanized forces use fear, loneliness, and isolation to demoralize populations and exert control, persuading large groups of people to act against their own interests, always with destructive results.
In The Psychology of Totalitarianism, world-renowned Professor of Clinical Psychology Mattias Desmet deconstructs the societal conditions that allow this collective psychosis to take hold. By looking at our current situation and identifying the phenomenon of mass formation--a type of collective hypnosis--he clearly illustrates how close we are to surrendering to totalitarian regimes.
With detailed analyses, examples, and results from years of research, Desmet lays out the steps that lead toward mass formation, including:
- An overall sense of loneliness and lack of social connections and bonds
- A lack of meaning--unsatisfying bullsh*t jobs that don't offer purpose
- Free-floating anxiety and discontent that arise from loneliness and lack of meaning
- Manifestation of frustration and aggression from anxiety
- Emergence of a consistent narrative from government officials, mass media, etc., that exploits and channels frustration and anxiety
In addition to clear psychological analysis--and building on Hannah Arendt's essential work on totalitarianism, The Origins of Totalitarianism--Desmet offers a sharp critique of the cultural groupthink that existed prior to the pandemic and advanced during the COVID crisis. He cautions against the dangers of our current societal landscape, media consumption, and reliance on manipulative technologies and then offers simple solutions--both individual and collective--to prevent the willing sacrifice of our freedoms.
We can honor the right to freedom of expression and the right to self-determination without feeling threatened by each other, Desmet writes. But there is a point where we must stop losing ourselves in the crowd to experience meaning and connection. That is the point where the winter of totalitarianism gives way to a spring of life.
Desmet has an . . . important take on everything that's happening in the world right now.--Aubrey Marcus, podcast host
[Desmet] is waking a lot of people up to the dangerous place we are now with a brilliant distillation of how we ended up here.--Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
Also in
General Political Science
How the World Really Works: The Science Behind How We Got Here and Where We're Going
Smil, Vaclav
Hardcover
Saving Us: A Climate Scientist's Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided World
Hayhoe, Katharine
Hardcover
Battling the Big Lie: How Fox, Facebook, and the Maga Media Are Destroying America
Pfeiffer, Dan
Hardcover
How Are You Going to Pay for That?: Smart Answers to the Dumbest Question in Politics
Cooper, Ryan
Hardcover
The Future Earth: A Radical Vision for What's Possible in the Age of Warming
Holthaus, Eric
Paperback
Consequences of Capitalism: Manufacturing Discontent and Resistance
Waterstone, Marv
Chomsky, Noam
Paperback
The Precipice: Neoliberalism, the Pandemic and the Urgent Need for Social Change
Polychroniou, C. J.
Chomsky, Noam
Paperback
Gangsters of Capitalism: Smedley Butler, the Marines, and the Making and Breaking of America's Empire
Katz, Jonathan M.
Hardcover
The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America
Grandin, Greg
Paperback
Let the People Pick the President: The Case for Abolishing the Electoral College
Wegman, Jesse
Paperback
Countdown to Zero Day: Stuxnet and the Launch of the World's First Digital Weapon
Zetter, Kim
Paperback
The Economists' Hour: False Prophets, Free Markets, and the Fracture of Society
Appelbaum, Binyamin
Paperback
The Naked Don't Fear the Water: An Underground Journey with Afghan Refugees
Aikins, Matthieu
Hardcover
King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa
Hochschild, Adam
Paperback
Optimism Over Despair: On Capitalism, Empire, and Social Change
Polychroniou, C. J.
Chomsky, Noam
Paperback
Thank You for Being Late: An Optimist's Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations (Version 2.0, with a New Afterword)
Friedman, Thomas L.
Paperback
Firefighting: The Financial Crisis and Its Lessons
Geithner, Timothy F.
Paulson, Henry M.
Bernanke, Ben S.
Paperback
Insurgency: How Republicans Lost Their Party and Got Everything They Ever Wanted
Peters, Jeremy W.
Hardcover
The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People's Economy
Kelton, Stephanie
Paperback
Adventure Capitalism: A History of Libertarian Exit, from the Era of Decolonization to the Digital Age
Craib, Raymond
Paperback
The Bodies of Others: The New Authoritarians, COVID-19 and The War Against the Human
Wolf, Naomi
Hardcover
What the Eyes Don't See: A Story of Crisis, Resistance, and Hope in an American City
Hanna-Attisha, Mona
Paperback
Directorate S: The C.I.A. and America's Secret Wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan
Coll, Steve
Paperback
Things Are Never So Bad That They Can't Get Worse: Inside the Collapse of Venezuela
Neuman, William
Hardcover
The Future Is Degrowth: A Guide to a World Beyond Capitalism
Vetter, Andrea
Schmelzer, Matthias
Vansintjan, Aaron
Paperback
Rush on the Radio: A Tribute from His Friend and Sidekick James Golden, Aka Bo Snerdley
Golden, James
Hardcover
Flipped: How Georgia Turned Purple and Broke the Monopoly on Republican Power
Bluestein, Greg
Hardcover
The Steal: The Attempt to Overturn the 2020 Election and the People Who Stopped It
Teague, Matthew
Bowden, Mark
Hardcover
People, Power, and Profits: Progressive Capitalism for an Age of Discontent
Stiglitz, Joseph E.
Hardcover
The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth
Quinones, Sam
Hardcover
Jackpot: How the Super-Rich Really Live--And How Their Wealth Harms Us All
Mechanic, Michael
Hardcover
The Improbable Wendell Willkie: The Businessman Who Saved the Republican Party and His Country, and Conceived a New World Order
Lewis, David Levering
Hardcover
It Could Happen Here: Why America Is Tipping from Hate to the Unthinkable--And How We Can Stop It
Greenblatt, Jonathan
Hardcover
Black Lives Matter at School: An Uprising for Educational Justice
Hagopian, Jesse
Jones, Denisha
Paperback
The Poison Squad: One Chemist's Single-Minded Crusade for Food Safety at the Turn of the Twentieth Century
Blum, Deborah
Paperback
The Sinking Middle Class: A Political History of Debt, Misery, and the Drift to the Right
Roediger, David
Paperback
Rising Up and Rising Down: Some Thoughts on Violence, Freedom and Urgent Means
Vollmann, William T.
Paperback
1,001 Voices on Climate Change: Everyday Stories of Flood, Fire, Drought, and Displacement from Around the World
Lockwood, Devi
Paperback
Thank You for Being Late: An Optimist's Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations
Friedman, Thomas L.
Hardcover
Prisoners of the American Dream: Politics and Economy in the History of the Us Working Class
Davis, Mike
Paperback
The Socialist Manifesto: The Case for Radical Politics in an Era of Extreme Inequality
Sunkara, Bhaskar
Paperback