Politics & Government
![Anne Applebaum - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B001IQULQS.jpg)
Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism
Named a BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR by The Washington Post and The Financial Times
"How did our democracy go wrong? This extraordinary document . . . is Applebaum's answer." -Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny
A Pulitzer Prize–winning historian explains, with electrifying clarity, why elites in democracies around the world are turning toward nationalism and authoritarianism.
From the United States and Britain to continental Europe and beyond, liberal democracy is under siege, while authoritarianism is on the rise. In Twilight of Democracy, Anne Applebaum, an award-winning historian of Soviet atrocities who was one of the first American journalists to raise an alarm about antidemocratic trends in the West, explains the lure of nationalism and autocracy. In this captivating essay, she contends that political systems with radically simple beliefs are inherently appealing, especially when they benefit the loyal to the exclusion of everyone else.
Despotic leaders do not rule alone; they rely on political allies, bureaucrats, and media figures to pave their way and support their rule. The authoritarian and nationalist parties that have arisen within modern democracies offer new paths to wealth or power for their adherents. Applebaum describes many of the new advocates of illiberalism in countries around the world, showing how they use conspiracy theory, political polarization, social media, and even nostalgia to change their societies.
Elegantly written and urgently argued, Twilight of Democracy is a brilliant dissection of a world-shaking shift and a stirring glimpse of the road back to democratic values.
"How did our democracy go wrong? This extraordinary document . . . is Applebaum's answer." -Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny
A Pulitzer Prize–winning historian explains, with electrifying clarity, why elites in democracies around the world are turning toward nationalism and authoritarianism.
From the United States and Britain to continental Europe and beyond, liberal democracy is under siege, while authoritarianism is on the rise. In Twilight of Democracy, Anne Applebaum, an award-winning historian of Soviet atrocities who was one of the first American journalists to raise an alarm about antidemocratic trends in the West, explains the lure of nationalism and autocracy. In this captivating essay, she contends that political systems with radically simple beliefs are inherently appealing, especially when they benefit the loyal to the exclusion of everyone else.
Despotic leaders do not rule alone; they rely on political allies, bureaucrats, and media figures to pave their way and support their rule. The authoritarian and nationalist parties that have arisen within modern democracies offer new paths to wealth or power for their adherents. Applebaum describes many of the new advocates of illiberalism in countries around the world, showing how they use conspiracy theory, political polarization, social media, and even nostalgia to change their societies.
Elegantly written and urgently argued, Twilight of Democracy is a brilliant dissection of a world-shaking shift and a stirring glimpse of the road back to democratic values.
Editorial Reviews
"The book to buy for insight into what Trump's rise and rule really mean-here and abroad-for democracy in our time."
-Ron Elving, NPR
"Applebaum's historical expertise and knowledge of contemporary Europe and the United States illuminate what is eternal and distinctive about the political perils facing us today . . . Twilight of Democracy offers many lessons on the long-standing struggle between democracy and dictatorship. But perhaps the most important is how fragile democracy is: Its survival depends on choices made every day by elites and ordinary people."
-Sheri Berman, Washington Post
"An often sobering, sometimes shocking, but never despairing account of the rise of authoritarianism in the West."
-Los Angeles Review of Books
"Anne Applebaum is a leading historian of communism and a penetrating investigator of contemporary politics. Here she sets her sights on the big question, one with which she herself has been deeply engaged in both Europe and America: How did our democracy go wrong? This extraordinary document, written with urgency, intelligence, and understanding, is her answer."
-Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny
"Friendships torn. Ideals betrayed. Alliances broken. In this, her most personal book, a great historian explains why so many of those who won the battles for democracy or have spent their lives proclaiming its values are now succumbing to liars, thugs, and crooks. Analysis, reportage, and memoir, Twilight of Democracy fearlessly tells the shameful story of a political generation gone bad."
-David Frum, author of Trumpocracy and Trumpocalypse
"Critically important for its muscular, oppositionist attack on the new right from within conservative ranks-and for the well-documented warning it embodies. Applebaum's views are especially welcome because she is a deliberate thinker and astute observer rather than just the latest pundit or politico . . . A knowledgeable, rational, necessarily dark take on dark realities."
-Kirkus Reviews (starred)
"In crisp, elegant prose . . . [Applebaum] describes the emotional power of conspiracy theories and of simple narratives that encourage national unity against a common enemy, even if that enemy is often more imagined than real."
-Christian Science Monitor
"Thought-provoking and gracefully written."
-Gabriel Schoenfeld, The American Interest
-Ron Elving, NPR
"Applebaum's historical expertise and knowledge of contemporary Europe and the United States illuminate what is eternal and distinctive about the political perils facing us today . . . Twilight of Democracy offers many lessons on the long-standing struggle between democracy and dictatorship. But perhaps the most important is how fragile democracy is: Its survival depends on choices made every day by elites and ordinary people."
-Sheri Berman, Washington Post
"An often sobering, sometimes shocking, but never despairing account of the rise of authoritarianism in the West."
-Los Angeles Review of Books
"Anne Applebaum is a leading historian of communism and a penetrating investigator of contemporary politics. Here she sets her sights on the big question, one with which she herself has been deeply engaged in both Europe and America: How did our democracy go wrong? This extraordinary document, written with urgency, intelligence, and understanding, is her answer."
-Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny
"Friendships torn. Ideals betrayed. Alliances broken. In this, her most personal book, a great historian explains why so many of those who won the battles for democracy or have spent their lives proclaiming its values are now succumbing to liars, thugs, and crooks. Analysis, reportage, and memoir, Twilight of Democracy fearlessly tells the shameful story of a political generation gone bad."
-David Frum, author of Trumpocracy and Trumpocalypse
"Critically important for its muscular, oppositionist attack on the new right from within conservative ranks-and for the well-documented warning it embodies. Applebaum's views are especially welcome because she is a deliberate thinker and astute observer rather than just the latest pundit or politico . . . A knowledgeable, rational, necessarily dark take on dark realities."
-Kirkus Reviews (starred)
"In crisp, elegant prose . . . [Applebaum] describes the emotional power of conspiracy theories and of simple narratives that encourage national unity against a common enemy, even if that enemy is often more imagined than real."
-Christian Science Monitor
"Thought-provoking and gracefully written."
-Gabriel Schoenfeld, The American Interest
Readers Top Reviews
Pepe ArizpeMarcus Fe
Buen análisis de la fragilidad de nuestros sistemas democráticos. Me ha sorprendido positivamente encontrar una sección dedicada a Vox y concuerdo absolutamente con su diagnóstico. He echado en falta que no haya extendido su análisis a Podemos, que es lo mismo al otro lado del espectro y utiliza tácticas similares, aunque quizás es mucho pedir dado que el caso de España se trata de una forma más superficial. Me quedo con la razón de fondo es que a la gente en general no le gusta la complejidad lo que para mí es una vulnerabilidad que nos hará siempre como sociedad receptivos al Populismo. En cualquier caso muy satisfecho y enhorabuena.
Kindle Hans Karlsen
She makes the politics of the current moment personal by telling stories of people who become authoritarian in Poland, Hungary, Spain, England, and America. Her discussion of Laura Ingraham is especially insightful. And her clear eyed speculation about the future is sobering. Soon we will know if America will take steps toward strengthening our democratic heritage or continue our march toward Authoritarianism.
Der Graf
A very incisive view of Poland and "Polishness". Quite damning but deservedly so. As Appelbaum points out, there WAS a glimmer of hope. It faded, substituted with the customary and traditional version of the Polish chauvinism and bigotry, all presented under the banner of "Under the White Eagle" patriotism. It IS a magnificent country, with magnificent culture and proud history, all consistently ruined by the backwardness and even sheer stupidity of the ultra-condervative elements within the Polish citizenry too often playing the principal role in Poland's politics. Still, the author of the solitary review of Appelbaum's book clearly misses what the "manor" signified and what it still signifies. Unsurprisingly, though: the review is written by an American and is based on the concepts of American conservatism. There is not much understanding of what Poland and Poles are about, of the maddening mixture of spirit, bravery, sentimentality, poetry, and the sheer pigheadedness that do often drove the country to near ruin and perdition. Erudite and wonderfully well written as the review is, but it sorely misses the mark. READ THE BLOODY BOOK then, discard what fancy scribes on the subject want you to think and believe, and form your own opinion - the book is worth the effort! Oh and by the way, I DO know about mannors, etc. Lived in them most of my life...
L. Glaesemann
Why would someone succumb to the lure of authoritarianism? This question ran through my mind as I read Anne Applebaum’s Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism. As I compiled a list of the contributing factors, a second thought appeared--we are all susceptible, no matter how educated we may be nor how much money we earn. Please note. Anne Applebaum reminds us that she refrained from providing a list of factors, as she urges us not to look for simple answers. It could be as little as one or it could be all of descriptors that pushed someone into the arms of totalitarianism. How would one ever know? Maybe this list should be seen as reasons rather than factors or descriptors. Regardless, please view what I have written as a gambit. Any mistakes are totally mine. Internal Factors (Reasons) • A person’s eccentricity leads him or her down the path of fanaticism and conspiracy (p. 9). • Inflammatory language is appealing (p. 9). • A political party that promotes opposing moral views of their current family situation is attractive (p. 10). • A scapegoat provides a simple answer to their country’s problems (p. 11). • Some are searching for a new identify that makes them feel special or superior (p. 12). • People can succumb to irrationality and their passions (p. 15). • Some people disdain complexity (p. 16). • Members of the intellectual elite become dissatisfied with the objective pursuit of truth to become promoters of extreme propaganda and conspiracy (p. 18). • Some believe that existing institutions are corrupt and need to be destroyed (p. 20). • Some are repulsed by the perceived weakness of the political center (p. 20). • Some are simply opportunists (p. 20). • Some who are deeply religious feel threatened by a secular society (p. 21). • Some are attracted to the idea of chaos (p. 21). • Many are looking to redefine their nations and rewrite social contracts (p. 21). • Some want to alter the rules of democracy so that they will never lose power (p. 21). • They believe that they will receive financial and social rewards for pledging loyalty (p.23). • They see it as an opportunity for upward mobility (p. 24). • They feel resentful because of their perceived lack of success in the current system (p. 24). • Some believe they deserve to rule (p. 29). • Some resent and are envious of others' success under the current system (p. 29). • Some are interested in a political career early on (p. 32). • Some are fascinated by authoritarian figures (p. 32). • Some hold anti-immigrant and anti-Semitic views (p. 46). • Some hold the perception that they feel patronized by the cultural elite (p. 50). • Some are a profound cynic (p. 52). • Some are searching to satisfy their desire for harmony and community (p. 59). • Some are nostalgic f...
Short Excerpt Teaser
I
New Year's Eve
On December 31, 1999, we threw a party. It was the end of one millennium and the start of a new one, and people very much wanted to celebrate, preferably somewhere exotic. Our party fulfilled that criterion. We held it at Chobielin, a small manor house in northwest Poland that my husband and his parents had purchased a decade earlier-for the price of the bricks-when it was a mildewed, uninhabitable ruin, unrenovated since the previous occupants fled the Red Army in 1945. We had restored the house, or most of it, though very slowly. It was not exactly finished in 1999, but it did have a new roof as well as a large, freshly painted, and completely unfurnished salon, perfect for a party.
The guests were various: journalist friends from London and Moscow, a few junior diplomats based in Warsaw, two friends who flew over from New York. But most of them were Poles, friends of ours and colleagues of my husband, Radek Sikorski, who was then a deputy foreign minister in a center-right Polish government. There were local friends, some of Radek's school friends, and a large group of cousins. A handful of youngish Polish journalists came too-none then particularly famous-along with a few civil servants and one or two very junior members of the government.
You could have lumped the majority of us, roughly, in the general category of what Poles call the right-the conservatives, the anti-Communists. But at that moment in history, you might also have called most of us liberals. Free-market liberals, classical liberals, maybe Thatcherites. Even those who might have been less definite about the economics did believe in democracy, in the rule of law, in checks and balances, and in a Poland that was a member of NATO and on its way to joining the European Union (EU), a Poland that was an integrated part of modern Europe. In the 1990s, that was what being "on the right" meant.
As parties go, it was a little scrappy. There was no such thing as catering in rural Poland in the 1990s, so my mother-in-law and I made vats of beef stew and roasted beets. There were no hotels, either, so our hundred-odd guests stayed in local farmhouses or with friends in the nearby town. I kept a list of who was staying where, but a couple of people still wound up sleeping on the floor in the basement. Late in the evening we set off fireworks-cheap ones, made in China, which had just become widely available and were probably extremely dangerous.
The music-on cassette tapes, made in an era before Spotify-created the only serious cultural divide of the evening: the songs that my American friends remembered from college were not the same as the songs that the Poles remembered from college, so it was hard to get everybody to dance at the same time. At one point I went upstairs, learned that Boris Yeltsin had resigned, wrote a brief column for a British newspaper, then went back downstairs and had another glass of wine. At about three in the morning, one of the wackier Polish guests pulled a small pistol out of her handbag and shot blanks into the air out of sheer exuberance.
It was that kind of party. It lasted all night, continued into "brunch" the following afternoon, and was infused with the optimism I remember from that time. We had rebuilt our ruined house. Our friends were rebuilding the country. I have a particularly clear memory of a walk in the snow-maybe it was the day before the party, maybe the day after-with a bilingual group, everybody chattering at once, English and Polish mingling and echoing through the birch forest. At that moment, when Poland was on the cusp of joining the West, it felt as if we were all on the same team. We agreed about democracy, about the road to prosperity, about the way things were going.
That moment has passed. Nearly two decades later, I would now cross the street to avoid some of the people who were at my New Year's Eve party. They, in turn, would not only refuse to enter my house, they would be embarrassed to admit they had ever been there. In fact, about half the people who were at that party would no longer speak to the other half. The estrangements are political, not personal. Poland is now one of the most polarized societies in Europe, and we have found ourselves on opposite sides of a profound divide, one that runs through not only what used to be the Polish right but also the old Hungarian right, the Spanish right, the French right, the Italian right, and, with some differences, the British right and the American right, too.
Some of my New Year's Eve guests-along with me and my husband-continued to support the pro-European, pro-rule-of-law, pro-market ...
New Year's Eve
On December 31, 1999, we threw a party. It was the end of one millennium and the start of a new one, and people very much wanted to celebrate, preferably somewhere exotic. Our party fulfilled that criterion. We held it at Chobielin, a small manor house in northwest Poland that my husband and his parents had purchased a decade earlier-for the price of the bricks-when it was a mildewed, uninhabitable ruin, unrenovated since the previous occupants fled the Red Army in 1945. We had restored the house, or most of it, though very slowly. It was not exactly finished in 1999, but it did have a new roof as well as a large, freshly painted, and completely unfurnished salon, perfect for a party.
The guests were various: journalist friends from London and Moscow, a few junior diplomats based in Warsaw, two friends who flew over from New York. But most of them were Poles, friends of ours and colleagues of my husband, Radek Sikorski, who was then a deputy foreign minister in a center-right Polish government. There were local friends, some of Radek's school friends, and a large group of cousins. A handful of youngish Polish journalists came too-none then particularly famous-along with a few civil servants and one or two very junior members of the government.
You could have lumped the majority of us, roughly, in the general category of what Poles call the right-the conservatives, the anti-Communists. But at that moment in history, you might also have called most of us liberals. Free-market liberals, classical liberals, maybe Thatcherites. Even those who might have been less definite about the economics did believe in democracy, in the rule of law, in checks and balances, and in a Poland that was a member of NATO and on its way to joining the European Union (EU), a Poland that was an integrated part of modern Europe. In the 1990s, that was what being "on the right" meant.
As parties go, it was a little scrappy. There was no such thing as catering in rural Poland in the 1990s, so my mother-in-law and I made vats of beef stew and roasted beets. There were no hotels, either, so our hundred-odd guests stayed in local farmhouses or with friends in the nearby town. I kept a list of who was staying where, but a couple of people still wound up sleeping on the floor in the basement. Late in the evening we set off fireworks-cheap ones, made in China, which had just become widely available and were probably extremely dangerous.
The music-on cassette tapes, made in an era before Spotify-created the only serious cultural divide of the evening: the songs that my American friends remembered from college were not the same as the songs that the Poles remembered from college, so it was hard to get everybody to dance at the same time. At one point I went upstairs, learned that Boris Yeltsin had resigned, wrote a brief column for a British newspaper, then went back downstairs and had another glass of wine. At about three in the morning, one of the wackier Polish guests pulled a small pistol out of her handbag and shot blanks into the air out of sheer exuberance.
It was that kind of party. It lasted all night, continued into "brunch" the following afternoon, and was infused with the optimism I remember from that time. We had rebuilt our ruined house. Our friends were rebuilding the country. I have a particularly clear memory of a walk in the snow-maybe it was the day before the party, maybe the day after-with a bilingual group, everybody chattering at once, English and Polish mingling and echoing through the birch forest. At that moment, when Poland was on the cusp of joining the West, it felt as if we were all on the same team. We agreed about democracy, about the road to prosperity, about the way things were going.
That moment has passed. Nearly two decades later, I would now cross the street to avoid some of the people who were at my New Year's Eve party. They, in turn, would not only refuse to enter my house, they would be embarrassed to admit they had ever been there. In fact, about half the people who were at that party would no longer speak to the other half. The estrangements are political, not personal. Poland is now one of the most polarized societies in Europe, and we have found ourselves on opposite sides of a profound divide, one that runs through not only what used to be the Polish right but also the old Hungarian right, the Spanish right, the French right, the Italian right, and, with some differences, the British right and the American right, too.
Some of my New Year's Eve guests-along with me and my husband-continued to support the pro-European, pro-rule-of-law, pro-market ...
