Dynamics of Political Opinion Formation including Catastrophe Theory

Abstract

After Nazism and Communism new forms of totalitarianism fostered by religious fundamentalism have arisen at the turn of the present century. In view of this fact we present a parsimonious quantitative model designed to shed some light on the dynamics of the formation of totalitarian systems. The model is constructed according to the principles of “sociodynamics” that belongs to the broad field of nonlinear dynamic systems theory (NDS). It comprises two order parameters and four trend parameters. All of them are socio-politically interpreted. Stationary, stagnant and revolutionary system-phases are exhibited in 10 scenarios. The relation to catastrophe theory is discussed.