twilight_of_democracy

TWILIGHT OF DEMOCRACY by Anne Applebaum

2020. Allen Lane. Hardback.

This is a 200-page Allen Lane hardback book that I almost read in a
single night, and the fact I didn't is the fault of my tiredness not
Anne Applebaum's. It's an intelligent argument against right-wing
nationalist movements; firstly those of Poland and Hungary and Spain
but then extending to the United Kingdom (Brexit) and the United
States (Donald Trump).

I'm a follower of most of the right-wing arguments so it's good to
have my beliefs challenged. In particular I'm a follower of the
Spectator Magazine and I was a fan of Brexit. I'm not such a fan of
these anymore after Applebaum's takedown of Boris Johnson and some of
the Spectator writers and editors she worked for. The book was well
worth reading for me just for the Spectator insights.

Many of the "Brussels are running our country" Brexit arguments were
early fictions of Boris Johnson's newspaper articles, which were
allowed to go unchallenged because they were entertaining. Applebaum
spends a lot of time examining the nostalgia of voters attracted to
Nationalism.

The thesis of this book is that after a political upheavel, the new
government trashes democracy by undermining institutions like
business, the media and the courts. Managers and workers are no longer
appointed and promoted on merit but now rise to the top based on
loyalty to the government, nepotism or some other cronyism. Communist
autocracies are the classic model of these but Applebaum sees this
happening in Nationalist Populist governments as well.

The US Supreme Court isn't mentioned in this book and the checks and
balances on the US President seem inadequate to Applebaum. I think
she's overly dramatic and things aren't nearly as dire as she makes
out. She's very strong in debunking the George Soros conspiracy.

Although lip service is briefly paid to some failings of the left
(cancel culture for example) the new right and the alt-right are
the targets of this polemic. The book starts and finishes with two
parties in Poland, an optimistic 1999 party with a broad spectrum of
attendees and a 2019 party with a politically narrower group of
friends. The subheading of Twilight of Democracy is "The Failure of
Politics and the Parting of Friends". Applebaum has lost friends to
the alt-right but found new friends in the meantime, mainly the
Never-Trunpers.

This was a very exciting book to read and I'll reread it again this
year (especially since it can be read in about three hours).

                                             16th July 2024.

My book reviews are at https://github.com/stucooper/booksiveread