Friedrich and Brzezinski utilized the term totalitarian dictatorship to separate the governments of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia from other autocracies in \u201cTotalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy.\u201d \u00a0In the words of Friedrich and Brzezinski the totalitarian dictatorship \u201cemerges as a system of rule for realizing totalist intentions under modern political and technical conditions\u201d, or put more simply, a system of complete control using modern technology and infrastructure (17). \u00a0Published in the 1950s \u201cTotalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy\u201d lost credibility with its false prophecy that the only way to neutralize a totalitarian state was from an external conflict with the destabilization of the Soviet state in the 1980s.<\/p>\n
Totalitarian dictatorship for Laqueur in \u201cIs there now, or has there ever been, such a thing as Totalitarianism?\u201d existed only within a specific time and place: the regime of National Socialism in Germany and the rule of Stalin in Soviet Russia. \u00a0Moving beyond Nazi Germany and Stalin\u2019s dictatorship in Soviet Russia, the governments shift away from a totalitarian state and towards a more relaxed authoritarian system. \u00a0Kershaw in \u201cTotalitarianism Revisited: Nazism and Stalinism in Comparative Presence,\u201d stipulated that totalitarianism existed as a \u201cphase\u201d in Stalin-ruled Russia and the beginning of Nazi Germany. \u00a0Both of these definitions, as opposed to Friedrich and Brzezinski\u2019s, have roughly thirty more years of Stalinist Russia to examine whilst making comparisons with Nazi Germany. \u00a0Laqueur and Kershaw, therefore, remain united in challenging the initial definition of totalitarianism as an institution that can only be changed by an external war.<\/p>\n
The common thread of all three of the definitions presented by the authors relied on the flexibility and variability of the concept totalitarianism. \u00a0Neither of the more modern authors completely disregards totalitarianism, just tweaks the initial concept to gain new meaning. \u00a0In this way the word becomes a representation for the continuing study and historiography of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Friedrich and Brzezinski utilized the term totalitarian dictatorship to separate the governments of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia from other autocracies in \u201cTotalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy.\u201d \u00a0In the words of Friedrich and Brzezinski the totalitarian dictatorship \u201cemerges as a system … Continue reading