totalitarians

noun

plural of totalitarian
as in authoritarians

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Example Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for totalitarians
  1. authoritarians
  2. autocrats
  3. potentates
  4. tyrants
  5. dictators
  6. despots
  7. oppressors
Noun
  • Not your grandma’s authoritarians Today’s authoritarian rulers realize that civil society has the potential to support democracy and pry loose their grip on power.
    — Christopher Justin Einolf, The Conversation, 26 Sep. 2025
Definition of authoritarians
Noun
  • These innovations may reduce the number of bureaucrats autocrats need.
    — Seva Gunitsky, Foreign Affairs, 1 Oct. 2026
  • In other countries that have recently experienced democratic backsliding, such as Turkey and Hungary, installing loyalists in the judiciary and in government agencies has played a key role in helping autocrats consolidate power.
    — Eyal Press, New Yorker, 28 Sep. 2026
Definition of autocrats
Noun
  • With 775 rooms, the palace also provides office space for the royal bureaucracy and hosts lavish state dinners for visiting presidents and potentates.
    — CBS News, CBS News, 26 June 2026
  • Biden put this sentiment into action by working with Netanyahu despite serious moral and political failures in Gaza, with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on NATO expansion, and with Gulf potentates on the region’s security architecture.
    — James Jeffrey, Foreign Affairs, 13 Nov. 2025
Definition of potentates
Noun
  • Because, after all, as in all of Haber’s novels, the point is not really what is happening in the world but what is happening in the mind—in this case the mind of the pettiest of tyrants.
    — Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 1 July 2026
  • Aegon, dragged out of King’s Landing by spymaster Lord Larys Strong (Matthew Needham) in an effort to save him from the fratricidal Aemond, gets an up-close look at the petty tyrants who have sprouted up in the countryside thanks to his impetuous rule.
    — Roxana Hadadi, Vulture, 18 June 2026
Definition of tyrants
Noun
  • No matter how powerful, dictators have always needed subordinates—censors, propagandists, security guards, police officers, intelligence analysts, and local bureaucrats—to carry out their orders.
    — Seva Gunitsky, Foreign Affairs, 1 Oct. 2026
  • For years, America’s conversation about the Middle East revolved around terrorism, stability, and the supposedly binary choice between friendly dictators and dangerous Islamists.
    — Ayman M. Mohyeldin, Vanity Fair, 11 Sep. 2026
Definition of dictators
Noun
  • In this telling, Ivan appears as a precursor to Stalin and other ruinous Russian despots.
    — Foreign Affairs, Foreign Affairs, 18 Aug. 2026
  • Of all the despots in the region, the Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad was perhaps the most ruthless in crushing dissent.
    — Andrew Marantz, New Yorker, 17 Aug. 2026
Definition of despots
Noun
  • Can an accurate story of a system of oppression be derived from sources created and preserved by the oppressors?
    — Drew Gilpin Faust, The New York Review of Books, 19 Sep. 2026
  • For the left that supports the Palestinian cause, Muslims are the oppressed and the West – including Israel – are the oppressors… Whether Muslims hold conservative-religious views in this context is irrelevant.
    — Tyler Speicher, FOXNews.com, 15 Sep. 2026
Definition of oppressors
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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totalitarianism
totalitarians
totalities
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Cite this Entry

“Totalitarians.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/totalitarians. Accessed 6 Oct. 2026.

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