Steven Heller’s latest tome, Iron Fists: Branding the 20th-century Totalitarian State, is an intense read. As an object, the book is an impressive chunk wrapped in black striped plastic, with the vibrant colors of propaganda peeking through the stripes from the inside cover. Yet the book structure and narrative are highly accessible.

Part coffee table artifact / part required design history reading, the book is a must for anyone interested in branding. It is a double dose of communication strategy and the history that proves its effectiveness. My history-buff, non-artist partner enjoyed it as much as I did, as the visual devices are brought to life within a vivid historical context. The swastika, Little Red Book, Lenin’s goatee, stylized Futurist posters, and gothic typography are among many examples used to manufacture messages of the totalitarian state. The author makes the case that these visuals function in the same fashion that corporate branding systems work today.

The comprehensive range of visual argument is especially relevant during an election year in which visuals of our American state eek through every surface.

The four main chapters outline the 20th-century regimes of the Nazis, fascists, and soviet and Chinese communists. Each demonstrates a forceful lesson about the principles of branding as embodied by the fürer, Il Duce, Comrade Lenin, and Chairman Mao. Heller outlines the “effective branding [that] is centered on a core narrative” with eloquent essays and lavish representations of historical photos, posters, flags, books, portraits, stamps, and charts.

Heller is at his best here: his painstaking research of the power of visual language when in the hands of tyrants is a gift to the discipline. The book is comprehensive and intense, but not intimidating. The writing is serious and courageous, but clever. Iron Fists contributes rigor to the growing scholarship of graphic design.

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