totalitarian
[toh-tal-i-tair-ee-uh n]
- of or relating to a centralized government that does not tolerate parties of differing opinion and that exercises dictatorial control over many aspects of life.
- exercising control over the freedom, will, or thought of others; authoritarian; autocratic.
Show More
- an adherent of totalitarianism.
Show More
Origin of totalitarian
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for totalitarian
Contemporary Examples
Indeed, history has shown us just how much of a threat schlocky Hollywood entertainment is to totalitarian governments.
North Korea’s Secret Movie Bootleggers: How Western Films Make It Into the Hermit KingdomLizzie Crocker
December 22, 2014
Kundera was reacting against the efforts of 20th-century totalitarian regimes to refashion novelists as propagandists.
Biographer Andrew Roberts argues that history has maligned Napoleon by lumping him in with totalitarian thugs.
One has to admit that a totalitarian empire is impossible without the Iron Curtain or a system of complete information isolation.
When he says ‘totalitarian liberalism,’ he means that the right of the nation trumps human rights.
Historical Examples
Convince her its governments were evil, totalitarian, when in reality they were democratic?
A World Called CrimsonDarius John Granger
The totalitarian era is passing, its old ideas blown away like leaves from an ancient, lifeless tree.
Modern China faces more than political problems; a totalitarian revolution has engulfed it.
Government in Republican ChinaPaul Myron Anthony Linebarger
The totalitarian state does not recognize personal liberties for the individual.
The concept of private property in the totalitarian state is also at variance with the democratic concept of private property.
totalitarian
- of, denoting, relating to, or characteristic of a dictatorial one-party state that regulates every realm of life
Show More
- a person who advocates or practises totalitarian policies
Show More
Word Origin
from totality + -arian
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for totalitarian
adj.
1926, first in reference to Italian fascism, formed in English on model of Italian totalitario "complete, absolute, totalitarian," from the Italian cognate of English total (adj.). The noun is recorded from 1938.
Show More
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper