totalitarian

[toh-tal-i-tair-ee-uhn]

adjective

1. 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.

2. exercising control over the freedom, will, or thought of others; authoritarian; autocratic.

noun

1. an adherent of totalitarianism.

totalitarian

/ təʊˌtælɪˈtɛərɪən /

adjective

1. of, denoting, relating to, or characteristic of a dictatorial one-party state that regulates every realm of life

noun

1. a person who advocates or practises totalitarian policies

Other Word Forms

• antitotalitarian adjective
• nontotalitarian adjective
• totalitarianism noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of totalitarian¹

First recorded in 1925–30; totalit(y) + -arian

Word History and Origins

Origin of totalitarian¹

from _totality + _-arian

Example Sentences

“The Handmaid’s Tale,” her prescient novel of totalitarian dictatorship, began with the group hanging scene, which was shifted to the back of the book.

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Stalin, who ruled the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953, presided over a totalitarian state that executed and imprisoned millions of people that he deemed political enemies.

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America is caught in a vise—on one side, “America first”; on the other, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and her crowd, whose New York breakthrough would strengthen totalitarian temptations.

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“A totalitarian state is in effect a theocracy,” Orwell wrote in his diary while he was working on the book.

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This exploitation was of course opportunistic in the extreme, but it also revealed something fundamental about totalitarian psychology.

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Related Words

• authoritarian 
• autocratic 
• monolithic 
• oppressive 
• tyrannical