What does this Party slogan mean? "Who controls the present controls the past, who controls the past controls the future."

First, the party
slogan in 's book is actually "Who controls the past controls the
future: who controls the present controls the past," not "Who controls the present
controls the past, who controls the past controls the future."

This
slogan first appears early in the book, in passing. Later, it occurs in a more substantive
discussion betweenand . In Winston's perception, the past has "never been altered,"
despite the fact there is unambiguous evidence that the Party has regularly engaged in historic
revisionism. "All that was needed," Winston recalls, "was an unending series of
victories over your own memory."

In other words, the slogan posits that
actions of today determine the course of events tomorrow. It further posits that actions taken
in the present are inspired by events that have occurred in the past. In order to inspire
actions designed to advance the ideological cause of the party, therefore, the presentation of
the past needs to be done in such a...