Democracy and despotism live closer together than you’d expect. Acclaimed political thinker John Keane reveals why that should alarm us all.
We live in troubled times, marked by a sinister trend gaining the upper hand everywhere: the triumph of despotism not only in countries like Russia, Iran and Saudi Arabia, but also in states run by popularly elected demagogues – Orbán and Erdoğan, Netanyahu and Trump.
John Keane shows why this new despotism defies the laws of political gravity. Instead of relying on fear or raw force, it fosters a strange, pseudo-democratic type of government, led by rulers skilled in winning public loyalty through government handouts, election-rigging, legal trickery, weaponised lying and talk of enemies. And, alarmingly, these leaders hunt in packs.
What’s so good about democracy? Keane explains that it’s much more than popular self-government based on free and fair elections. Democracy is a collective insistence that unaccountable power is always dangerous – and that it’s the best way to stop demagogues and despots from ruining life on our planet.
‘John Keane vividly describes the greed, ambition and political cunning that underpin the world’s new age of despotism. Unsparing in his analysis, Keane nevertheless holds out the hope that the spirit of true democracy will eventually prevail.’ – Victor Mallet, author of Far-right France: Le Pen, Bardella and the future of Europe
‘In a field choking on academic jargon, Demagogues and Despots reads like a blast of cold air – urgent and merciless in its clarity. Keane writes in images that cut, but the real force is in what they reveal: “Demagogues are despots in the making. Despots are what demagogues would like to be.” This is the book the field needed and did not know how to ask for.’ – Umut Özkırımlı, author of Theories of Nationalism: A critical introduction
‘An urgent book stunning in its sweep and depth, Demagogues and Despots flags a frightening possibility: despotism may no longer be something that’s happening to other people.’ – Debasish Roy Chowdhury, co-author of To Kill a Democracy: India’s passage to despotism
‘Keane exposes a world confronted by a new despotism spreading across the globe, feeding on democracy itself, and seducing citizens while hollowing out its core.A bracing, indispensable guide to how despotism works and how to resist it.’ – Olivia Stokes Dreier, Senior Research Fellow for Global Challenges to Democracy, Toda Peace Institute
‘John Keane is one of the world’s leading thinkers on democracy – past, present and future. As becomes clear from this extraordinary book, democracy is under threat as never before, both from external threats but also, and more alarmingly, from the internal threat of despotism and demagoguery. A must-read for anyone who cares about how contemporary events are conspiring to underline the democratic inheritance.’ – Simon Tormey, author of Populism: A beginner’s guide
‘This is a rare kind of book – one devoted to the rise of despotism, yet one that leaves you optimistic about the future of democracy.’ – Ivan Krastev, Chairman, Centre for Liberal Strategies, Sofia, and author of After Europe
‘Keane is warning us of what lies ahead if we do not defend democracy; how despots and would-be demagogues will treat us if they obtain power. The choice is ours.’ – Braham Dabscheck, Newtown Review of Books
‘Written with style and authority.’ – Henry Johnston, Good Reading Magazine
