Orwellian

Orwellian is an adjective derived from the name of British writer George Orwell, used to describe a political or social environment characterized by authoritarian control, pervasive surveillance, and manipulation of truth. The term evokes the world of Orwell's novels, most notably 1984 (1949), in which the state, personified as Big Brother, exercises totalitarian power through monitoring, censorship, and the rewriting of history.

Common features associated with an Orwellian system include extensive state surveillance and data collection; censorship and control of information; propaganda and the use of language to limit thought, exemplified by Newspeak and doublespeak; and the punishment or criminalization of dissenting ideas (thoughtcrime). The regime seeks to shape what people can even think by restricting discourse and undermining trust in objective reality.

In contemporary usage, "Orwellian" is applied to policies, technologies, or practices viewed as resembling those described by Orwell, such as mass surveillance, information manipulation, government secrecy, or coercive political correctness. It is frequently employed in journalism, political commentary, and academic analysis to describe threats to civil liberties and democratic norms. Critics note that the term can be rhetorical or hyperbolic when applied to imperfect or evolving systems, and should be used with care to distinguish genuine authoritarian patterns from merely heavy-handed governance.