IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cuf/wpaper/766.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Mathematics of Mind Control: Modeling Brainwashing and Ideological Power in Totalitarian Regimes

Author

Listed:
  • Heng-fu Zou

Abstract

This paper develops a mathematical framework for analyzing brainwashing and ideological control as employed by totalitarian regimes from the Cold War era to the present. Drawing on classic psychological studies from the Korean War and Chinese reeducation campaigns, as well as more recent research on propaganda, surveillance, and mass conformity, we construct a system of nonlinear differential equations to model the dynamic interaction between political power, belief conformity, and institutional memory. Simulations demonstrate how regimes consolidate control through feedback mechanisms of coercion and indoctrination, how ideological collapse can cascade into political breakdown, and how some regimes recover through adaptive belief reconstruction.By integrating historical case studies-ranging from Maoist China and Stalinist Russia to North Korea and digital authoritarianism in the 21st century -- this study provides a rigorous account of how totalitarian brainwashing operates and endures. The model offers predictive insights into regime stability, vulnerability to ideological shocks, and the long-run entropy of enforced belief systems.

Suggested Citation

  • Heng-fu Zou, 2025. "The Mathematics of Mind Control: Modeling Brainwashing and Ideological Power in Totalitarian Regimes," CEMA Working Papers 766, China Economics and Management Academy, Central University of Finance and Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:cuf:wpaper:766
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://down.aefweb.net/WorkingPapers/w766.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. King, Gary & Pan, Jennifer & Roberts, Margaret E., 2013. "How Censorship in China Allows Government Criticism but Silences Collective Expression," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 107(2), pages 326-343, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Leopoldo Fergusson & Carlos Molina, 2020. "Facebook Causes Protests," HiCN Working Papers 323, Households in Conflict Network.
    2. Sandra Wankmüller, 2023. "A comparison of approaches for imbalanced classification problems in the context of retrieving relevant documents for an analysis," Journal of Computational Social Science, Springer, vol. 6(1), pages 91-163, April.
    3. Lai, Weizheng, 2024. "The effect of education on voter turnout in China's rural elections," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 221(C), pages 230-247.
    4. Guriev, Sergei & Treisman, Daniel, 2020. "A theory of informational autocracy," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 186(C).
    5. Zhiming Cheng & Russell Smyth, 2016. "Why Give it Away When You Need it Yourself? Understanding Public Support for Foreign Aid in China," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 52(1), pages 53-71, January.
    6. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/5744igqofr9qr9hjd2eiomr7qc is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Sergei Guriev & Daniel Treisman, 2020. "The Popularity of Authoritarian Leaders: A cross-national investigation," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03878626, HAL.
    8. Erin Baggott Carter & Brett L. Carter, 2021. "Propaganda and Protest in Autocracies," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 65(5), pages 919-949, May.
    9. Yue Wu, 2024. "Creation, Consumption, and Control of Sensitive Content," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 43(4), pages 885-902, July.
    10. Zhang, Weidong & Zuo, Na & He, Wu & Li, Songtao & Yu, Lu, 2021. "Factors influencing the use of artificial intelligence in government: Evidence from China," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    11. Xiaojun Li & Dingding Chen, 2021. "Public opinion, international reputation, and audience costs in an authoritarian regime," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 38(5), pages 543-560, September.
    12. Emilie Frenkiel & Anna Shpakovskaya, 2019. "The Evolution of Representative Claim-Making by the Chinese Communist Party: From Mao to Xi (1949–2019)," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 7(3), pages 208-219.
    13. Sergei Guriev & Nikita Melnikov & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2021. "3G Internet and Confidence in Government," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 136(4), pages 2533-2613.
    14. Caroline Schlaufer & Marina Pilkina & Tatiana Chalaya & Tatiana Khaynatskaya & Tatiana Voronova & Aleksandra Pozhivotko, 2022. "How do civil society organizations communicate in an authoritarian setting? A narrative analysis of the Russian waste management debate," Review of Policy Research, Policy Studies Organization, vol. 39(6), pages 730-751, November.
    15. Günther G. Schulze & Nikita Zakharov, 2025. "Political Cycles of Media Repression," Discussion Paper Series 52 JEL Classification: D7, Department of International Economic Policy, University of Freiburg, revised Feb 2025.
    16. Daron Acemoglu & Tarek A. Hassan & Ahmed Tahoun, 2018. "The Power of the Street: Evidence from Egypt’s Arab Spring," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 31(1), pages 1-42.
    17. Xiukang Wang, 2022. "Managing Land Carrying Capacity: Key to Achieving Sustainable Production Systems for Food Security," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(4), pages 1-21, March.
    18. Ming Ma & Feng Han & Chuyao Wang, 2025. "Panacea or Pandora’s box: diverse governance strategies for conspiracy theories and their consequences in China," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 12(1), pages 1-14, December.
    19. James Evans, 2022. "From Text Signals to Simulations: A Review and Complement to Text as Data by Grimmer, Roberts & Stewart (PUP 2022)," Sociological Methods & Research, , vol. 51(4), pages 1868-1885, November.
    20. John Chung-En Liu & Huijing Huang & Jingyi Ma, 2019. "Understanding China’s environmental challenges: lessons from documentaries," Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, Springer;Association of Environmental Studies and Sciences, vol. 9(2), pages 151-158, June.
    21. Charity S. Jacobs & Kathleen M. Carley, 2024. "#WhatIsDemocracy: finding key actors in a Chinese influence campaign," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 30(2), pages 127-147, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cuf:wpaper:766. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Qiang Gao (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/emcufcn.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.