Accusatory Inversion. Propaganda, Narrative Control and the Simulation of Political Power. - José Esteban Oria

Modern dictatorships do not always eliminate institutions; more often they preserve them while emptying them of their original meaning. Courts continue to issue rulings, elections are still held, and political debate appears to exist. Yet the real capacity of society to influence power gradually disappears.

In this context emerges a central mechanism that this book calls accusatory inversion.

Accusatory inversion is a political strategy in which those who hold power accuse their opponents of committing the very actions that they themselves are carrying out. Through this process, the aggressor presents himself as the victim, while those who denounce abuses of power are portrayed as conspirators or threats to political stability.

Through this mechanism, power does not merely control institutions; it also controls the narrative framework through which political events are interpreted.

This book develops the concept of accusatory inversion as an analytical tool to understand how certain authoritarian regimes manipulate public discourse, legitimize repression, and reshape the interpretation of political reality.

Using the Venezuelan political crisis following the presidential elections of July 28, 2024 as a central case study, the author examines how accusations of conspiracy and coup attempts were used to neutralize opposition claims of electoral fraud and consolidate political control.

Combining political theory, discourse analysis, and contextual reconstruction of events, the book shows how accusatory inversion can become a structural mechanism of political power.

When this process becomes consolidated, politics ceases to function as a genuine arena of democratic contestation and instead turns into a managed simulation where institutions remain visible but their democratic substance has been progressively hollowed out.

Accusatory Inversion offers a new framework for understanding how modern authoritarian systems maintain power not only through coercion, but through the manipulation of political narratives and the control of meaning itself.