Examples of Dictatorial Seizures of the Media
Martin Moore and Thomas Colley, Dictating Reality: The Global Battle to Control the News (New York: Columbia University Press, October 2025). Paperback: $28: 368pp: 978-0-231212-91-5.
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“From the United States to China and from Brazil to India, an authoritarian approach to news is spreading across the world. Increasingly, the media is no longer a check on power or a source of objective information but a means by which governments and leaders can propagate their versions of reality, however biased or false.” Trump fired the labor-statistics economist over negative data-reporting the other day, so this is a relevant history for this present moment. Though this study is also an example of propaganda because it demonizes 7 outsider-countries (that are regularly displayed as villains in US-media): Russia, China, Hungary, India, Brazil, and Mexico. On the other hand, the introduction does point out this omission by stating: “Although no single chapter is devoted to the United States, like Banquo’s ghost it haunts the book throughout. Many of the techniques to influence the news documented throughout this book have been integral to Donald Trump’s media strategy prior to and since his re-election in 2024.” “Trump” is mentioned 118 times across this book, so he is indeed the ghost haunting this study. The purpose is clearly to explain the totalitarian turn in the US by comparison with how such media-control happens at suppressive extremes elsewhere. Though the stress is on accusing rivals, without seeing that America has been following the same authoritarian playbook but with fewer outsider-publishers daring to criticize them, or without letting these critiques enter the academic mainstream. For example, the US media had information on Donald Trump’s association with Epstein since the 1980s. It only chose to make it a point-of-public-interest recently after a billionaire like Musk seems to have sponsored this raising of alarm. Trump bombed Iraq’s nuclear sites while selling this as a “liberator” move, or as a logical solution to stop an immediate nuclear threat, after Israel had been selling propaganda about this threat being imminent for decades without any material proof of Iran developing any nuclear-weapon. America has been making the worst imaginable decisions in its wars, from throwing the atomic-bombs at Japan after they had mostly surrendered, to starting the Iraq war over false claims of Iraq’s development of nuclear weapons. While Russia has been in an immoral war with Ukraine for a few years, the US has been in non-stop immoral wars for a century.
“Martin Moore and Thomas Colley show how states are battling to control and shape the news in order to entrench their power, evade scrutiny, and ensure that their political narratives are accepted. Combining in-depth analyses of seven countries with a compelling range of stories and characters from around the world, they demonstrate the unprecedented scale and scope of governments’ efforts to take control of the media.” It “details how Xi’s China, Putin’s Russia, Modi’s India, AMLO’s Mexico, Bolsonaro’s Brazil, and Orban’s Hungary have all sought, in their different ways, to exploit news to manufacture alternative realities—and how their methods have taken hold in the United States, the United Kingdom, and other democracies.”
The US Public Broadcasting Corporation just announced its closing because it has been defunded. Colbert was just fired for making a joke about corruption between businesses and totalitarian-leaders. One sign that propaganda is working is if the people are not aware they are being lied to. There are sources this author found that prove that India’s “news owners” are trying “to outdo one another in their support for the BJP government.” This means that some reporters in India are reporting on this corrupt influence. In contrast, in the US news support the two corrupted political parties without significant rival outlets breaking through to report that corruption is taking place.
As I browsed through this book, I found that its claims are supported with sources. Its opinions are offered with proof. Few lines go by where theory is not supported with facts. Overall, this is a well-researched, and densely-sourced study. Those who research corruption in the media would benefit from reading it closely. Those who are concerned citizens, or who discuss media-bias on social-media would also benefit from reading it. Its style is easy enough for anybody to read through it without difficulty. And yet it is dense enough to provide new information for specialists in this field. It is a good acquisition for any type of library.
--Pennsylvania Literary Journal: https://anaphoraliterary.com/journals/plj/plj-excerpts/book-reviews-summer-2025/

A really important book. Very detailed research and analysis using different country examples to explain how authoritarian leaders are controlling the information narrative. These leaders are seeking to ‘ replace verified truth with authorative truth’. Clear recommendations of work to do for democracies. Excellent, great read. Thank you to the authors. Thank you to #netgalley and the publisher for an ARC.

This file is completely unreadable, got 20% in and had to bail. Fix your formating guys I know you can do it.