A Commonplace Book

[W]ords are still the principal instruments of control. Suggestions are words. Persuasions are words. Orders are words. No control machine so far devised can operate without words, and any control machine which attempts to do so relying entirely on external force or entirely on physical control of the mind will soon encounter the limits of control....

The Mayan control system, where the priests kept the all-important Books of seasons and gods, the Calender, was predicated on the illiteracy of the workers. Modern control systems are predicated on universal literacy since they operate through the mass media....

The mass media has proven a very unreliable and even treacherous instrument of control. It is uncontrollable owing to its need for NEWS. If one paper, or even a string of papers owned by the same person, makes that story hotter as NEWS, some other paper will pick it up. Any imposition of government censorship on the media is a step in the direction of State control, a step which big money is most reluctant to take.

[O]nce embarked on a policy of control, the leaders must continue the policy as a matter of self-preservation.... [T]hey will endeavour to convince the others that this is a cooperative enterprise in which they are all working for the same goal. They may also make concessions.... A concession of course means the retention of control... Here's a dime, I keep a dollar.... By persuasion and concessions they hope to prevent a concerted attack.

[A]nother essential factor in control is to conceal from the controlled the actual intentions of the controllers.

A government is never more dangerous than when embarking on a self-defeating or downright suicidal course.