Does AI Make Totalitarianism More Likely? – demonstrandom■

Does AI Make Totalitarianism More Likely?

Technology and Society

Essays

Speculation

Governance

Published

February 19, 2026

Introduction

Much of the contemporary AI risk discourse focuses on large-scale existential threats to the human species. However, there are more mundane risks that are also worth considering, one of which is the possibility that AI could enable a new wave of totalitarianism.

Background

Throughout history, advances in communication and bureaucratic technology have enabled larger and more powerful states, with increased ability to monitor and control their populations. In particular, the first half of the twentieth century saw the rise of totalitarian regimes that used new technologies to achieve unprecedented levels of control.

For example, the Nazi regime made deliberate use of mass radio to saturate daily life with centralized propaganda. Under Goebbels, the government promoted the inexpensive Volksempfänger radio receiver to reliably deliver state broadcasts to common households. By controlling the primary communication channel, the regime reduced the space in which dissenting narratives could circulate. Beyond radio, the Nazis also used punch-card tabulating systems supplied by IBM (through its German subsidiary) to process census data. This allowed the regime to act on its ideological priorities with greater speed and consistency, rapidly identifying Jews and other targeted groups.

Other totalitarian governments have made use of similar technologies for various other means of suppressing dissent. For example, in East Germany, the Stasi used an immense archive of files, informant reports, intercepted mail, and wiretaps to anticipate and disrupt dissent before it became organized.

On the other hand, some communication technologies have also been associated with increases in liberty. The spread of print in early modern Europe weakened centralized control over information and helped erode religious and political monopolies. Pamphlets and inexpensive books allowed dissenting ideas to circulate beyond elite circles, contributing to movements such as the Reformation and later democratic revolutions. In some ways, the concept of a written constitution as the foundational bedrock of the United States is contingent on widespread literacy and print culture.

The early internet appeared to have similar decentralizing effects. Digital networks lower the cost of publishing, enabling peer-to-peer communication and reduced reliance on state-controlled broadcasters. During the Arab Spring (~2010-2011), activists in Tunisia and Egypt used platforms like Facebook and Twitter to coordinate protests, share information about state repression, and mobilize large numbers of citizens.

This motivates a natural question: will AI enable more centralized modes of organization, like top-down bureaucracies and totalitarianism, or will it empower more decentralized systems, like markets and civil society?

Structural Mechanisms

Despite the concept of fascism making the “trains run on time”, most historical totalitarian governments were economically dysfunctional, especially compared with their democratic counterparts. In some ways, the entire 20th century can be read as a competition between the relatively decentralized liberal market democracies of the West and relatively centralized totalitarian regimes in Europe and Asia, with the former winning decisively in multiple hot and cold wars, economic growth, cultural production, and technological innovation.

What sort of structural mechanisms explain this pattern? Why did totalitarian regimes underperform democracies, and how might AI change those mechanisms?

We can consider various governments as constrained by their cost-benefit curves. For example, costs of planning, consensus, monitoring, coercion, persuasion, coordination, etc., alter which governance mechanisms are most cost-effective for a given regime. The 20th century favored decentralization because centralization was too expensive, but AI may change many of these costs. For example:

Correlates with authoritarianism:

Increased centralized information-processing capacity (Hayek and Kantorovich)

Reduced dependence on broad human labor for wealth generation (Selectorate Theory and the Resource Curse)

Lower monitoring and enforcement costs (Surveillance at Scale)

More reliable coercive force with reduced defection risk (Robot Armies)

Greater narrative control and centralized propaganda capacity (Propaganda)

Regime coordination advantages over opposition coordination advantages (Coordination Asymmetry)

Anti-correlates with authoritarianism:

Enhanced distributed information processing (Policy Modeling and Foresight)

Improved large-coalition aggregation (Consensus Formation)

Monitoring symmetry between state and citizens (Transparency and Auditability)

Diffusion of coercive capacity (Civil-Military Diffusion)

Strengthened...