You can "control the masses" with anything that plays heavily on their insecure minds. It might be religion, financial security, hatred of foreigners, material greed, political fanaticism, a sense of grievance over past wrongs and persecutions (refer to Nazi Germany and Israel and Al Queda for spectacular examples of that!), a sense of racial superiority and "manifest destiny" (Germany, Rome, Israel, the USA, Japan, etc...)...any darn thing at all!

And at the basis of it will be...Fear. Fear based on a sense of separation and disunity from one's fellow human beings. Love unites. Fear divides. Love see the similarities and forgives the differences. Fear sees only the differences and forgives nothing.