Totalitarian governments, by their very nature demand control over the people, encompassing all aspects of their lives, and through the use of surveillance, this control is maintained. Through the works of Anthony Burgess in A Clockwork Orange, Tom Rob Smith in Child 44, and George Orwell in 1984, these authors take a closer look into the necessity of surveillance in the survival of any totalitarian government. To begin with, the motivation for using surveillance over the people stems from the concept of power, maintaining the power of the state is the ultimate goal, and as long as the state is maintained, any measure taken is worth it. In addition, through the use of surveillance, governments are capable of creating an environment where the …show more content…
Giroux adds to this again in his analysis of the modern surveillance oriented world, where he states “The self has become not simply the subject of surveillance but a willing participant and object” (Giroux 5). The children of this nation fall into this category, they join the Party, they embrace its teachings, and they in turn become part of the family of the Party, a family which they now have stronger ties to than the ties with their biological family. This misplaced hierarchy of family ties in turn creates an environment where “The family had become in effect an extension of the Thought Police. It was a device by means of which everyone could be surrounded night and day by informers who knew him intimately” (Orwell 168). The government benefits even further from this by essentially receiving free surveillance over the people, since the division in the family encourages reporting of people who are lesser in the eyes of the state. “A culture of control in which the most cherished notions of agency collapse into unabashed narcissistic exhibitions and confessions of the self, serving as willing fodder for the spying state” (Giroux 5), adequately describes what arises from this situation, with the prospect …show more content…
One of the most effective ways to mold any generation is through fear of punishment, and totalitarian governments employ this in order to teach conformity to the regime, as evidenced by Raisa’s observance of the schoolchildren she teaches in Child 44 “Even from the age of six the children understood that to disrespect authority, to speak out of turn was to take your life into your own hands” (Smith__). Regardless of how they learn it, whether it be fear or reward, conformity to societal norms is key to the shaping the future of a nation, and ensuring the children learn this early one guarantees success in passing on the ideals of the state government. As Giroux points out, this ties perfectly in with surveillance of the people as “Surveillance feeds on the related notions of fear and delusion” (5). The threat of nonconformity to the state is heightened by the fact you will be caught and punished, so the notion of fear of the government fuels this cycle, one trapping the people at the foot of the state’s wishes. “Recruiting brutal young roughs for the police. Proposing debilitating and will-sapping techniques of conditioning… Before we know where we are we shall have the full apparatus of totalitarianism” (__), in addition to teaching the next generation the importance of