False dichotomies there. Collectivism is not lacking surveillance, it's just that the surveillance is distributed and decentralized, you have citizens snooping

False dichotomies there. Collectivism is not lacking surveillance, it's just that the surveillance is distributed and decentralized, you have citizens snooping on other people's business and ratting them out for their political beliefs (a behavior common in former soviet countries). Individualism does not require surveillance. The existence of the state does though, and if the preference of the citizens is for individualism, they delegate their collective surveillance duties to the police/army/secret services etc. Individualism is possible without a state, collectivism is not.