How Democracies Die

Donald Trump’s presidency has raised a query that many people by no means thought we’d be asking: Is our democracy in peril? Harvard professors Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt have spent greater than twenty years learning the breakdown of democracies in Europe and Latin America, they usually consider the reply is sure. Democracy not ends with a bang—in a revolution or army coup—however with a whimper: the gradual, regular weakening of vital establishments, such because the judiciary and the press, and the gradual erosion of long-standing political norms. The excellent news is that there are a number of exit ramps on the street to authoritarianism. The unhealthy information is that, by electing Trump, we’ve already handed the primary one.

Drawing on many years of analysis and a variety of historic and international examples, from Thirties Europe to modern Hungary, Turkey, and Venezuela, to the American South throughout Jim Crow, Levitsky and Ziblatt present how democracies die—and the way ours might be saved.

Reward for How Democracies Die


“What we desperately want is a sober, dispassionate have a look at the present state of affairs. Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, two of essentially the most revered students within the area of democracy research, provide simply that.”
—
The Washington Publish

“The place Levitsky and Ziblatt make their mark is in weaving collectively political science and historic evaluation of each home and worldwide democratic crises; in doing so, they develop the dialog past Trump and earlier than him, to different international locations and to the deep construction of American democracy and politics.”
—Ezra Klein, Vox

“When you solely learn one ebook for the remainder of the yr, learn 
How Democracies Die. . . .This isn’t a ebook for simply Democrats or Republicans. It’s a ebook for all Individuals. It’s nonpartisan. It’s truth based mostly. It’s deeply rooted in historical past. . . . One of the best commentary on our politics, no contest.”
—Michael Morrell, former Appearing Director of the Central Intelligence Company (through Twitter)

“A wise and deeply knowledgeable ebook concerning the methods by which democracy is being undermined in dozens of nations world wide, and in methods which are completely authorized.”
—Fareed Zakaria, 
CNN