Three seminal early works on brainwashing are Edward Hunter's journalistic Brainwashing and Brain-washing in Red China, and Robert Lifton's more scholarly Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism. Hunter's books convey the paranoid atmosphere of 1950s anti-Communist America. Lifton's book, despite its offputting title, is a fascinating account of the Chinese Communists' programmes of thought reform. More recently, John Marks, The Search for the "Manchurian Candidate" describes CIA research into mind control.

Cults and Social Psychology

Cults, by Marc Galanter, is a psychological analysis of cult behaviour, while John Ronson's Them is a lighter look at extremists of various kinds. For a detailed history of fundamentalist thinking, see Karen Armstrong's The Battle for God.

For more on influence techniques, Influence, by Robert Cialdini, and Age of Propaganda, by Pratkanis and Aronson, are both immensely readable. For a psychologist's investigation of group behaviour, see Ervin Staub, The Psychology of Good and Evil. For social psychology in general, Hewstone and Stroebe's Introduction to Social Psychology is a good place to start.

Neuroscience

Susan Greenfield's Brain Story and Rita Carter's Mapping the Mind are introductions to the field. For the academic detail, see Cacioppo and colleagues' Foundations in Social Neuroscience or Kandel and colleagues' Principles of Neural Science.

Free Will

Daniel Dennett's Freedom Evolves is a good, if at times fairly technical, introduction to recent philosophical thinking on free will. A useful selection of classic essays on the subject is Free Will, edited by Robert Kane. The analysis of psychological function in economic terms is exemplified by George Ainslie's Breakdown of Will, which is also technical in parts, but well worth the effort. The Volitional Brain, by Benjamin Libet and colleagues, looks at the neuroscience of free will.

The Media and Politics

Murray Edelman's The Politics of Misinformation and John Street's Mass Media, Politics and Democracy are good sources for more information about the distorting effects of mass communications. Isaiah Berlin's 'Two concepts of liberty' is a seminal essay on liberalism, a theme elaborated on by Brian Barry in Culture and Equality. For the other end of the political spectrum, Hannah Arendt's Totalitarianism is a classic of the field.

References

Hunter, E. (1951), Brain-washing in Red China: the calculated destruction of men's minds. New York: Vanguard Press.
Hunter, E. (1956/1959), Brainwashing: the story of men who defied it. London: World Distributors (Manchester).
Lifton, R.J. (1961), Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: a study of "brainwashing" in China. London: Victor Gollancz.
Marks, J. (1977/1991), The Search for the "Manchurian Candidate". New York: W.W. Norton.
Galanter, M. (1999), Cults: faith, healing, and coercion, 2nd edition. New York: Oxford University Press.
Armstrong, K. (2001), The Battle for God: fundamentalism in Judaism, Christianity and Islam. London: HarperCollins.
Cialdini, R.B. (2002), Influence: science and practice, 4th edition. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon.
Pratkanis, A.R. and Aronson, E. (2001), Age of Propaganda: the everyday use and abuse of persuasion, revised edition. New York: W.H. Freeman.
Staub, E. (2003), The Psychology of Good and Evil: why children, adults, and groups help and harm others. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Hewstone, M. and Stroebe, W. (2001), Introduction to Social Psychology, 3rd edition. Oxford: Blackwell.
Greenfield, S. (2000), Brain Story: unlocking our inner world of emotions, memories, ideas and desires. London: BBC Worldwide.
Carter, R. (2000), Mapping the Mind. London: Phoenix.
Cacioppo, J.T., Berntson, G.G., Adolphs, R., et al., eds. (2002), Foundations in Social Neuroscience. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Kandel, E.R., Schwartz, J.H., and Jessell, T.M., eds. (2000), Principles of Neural Science, 4th edition. London: McGraw-Hill.
Dennett, D.C. (2003), Freedom Evolves. London: Allen Lane.
Kane, R., ed. (2002), Free Will. Oxford: Blackwell.
Ainslie, G. (2001), Breakdown of Will. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Libet, B., Freeman, A., and Sutherland, K., eds. (1999), The Volitional Brain: towards a neuroscience of free will. Thorverton: Imprint Academic.
Edelman, M. (2001), The Politics of Misinformation. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Street, J. (2001), Mass Media, Politics and Democracy. Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave.
Berlin, I. (1958/1969), 'Two concepts of liberty'. In Four Essays on Liberty. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 118-72 (reprinted in many other places).
Barry, B. (2001), Culture and Equality: an egalitarian critique of multiculturalism. Cambridge: Polity.
Arendt, H. (1951), Totalitarianism. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World.