Book
Licensed
Unlicensed
Requires Authentication
The People vs. Democracy
Why Our Freedom Is in Danger and How to Save It
-
Yascha Mounk
Language:
English
Published/Copyright:
2018
About this book
A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice
“Everyone worried about the state of contemporary politics should read this book.”
—Anne-Marie Slaughter
“A trenchant survey from 1989, with its democratic euphoria, to the current map of autocratic striving.”
—David Remnick, New Yorker
The world is in turmoil. From Russia and Turkey across Europe to the United States, authoritarian populists have seized power as two core components of liberal democracy—individual rights and the popular will—are increasingly at war. As the role of money in politics has soared, a system of “rights without democracy” has taken hold. Populists who rail against this say they want to return power to the people. But in practice they create something just as bad: a system of “democracy without rights.” Yascha Mounk offers a clear and trenchant analysis of what ails our democracy and what it will take to get it back on track.
“Democracy is going through its worst crisis since the 1930s… But what exactly is the nature of this crisis? And what is driving it? The People vs. Democracy stands out in a crowded field for the quality of its answers to these questions.”
—The Economist
“Brilliant… As this superb book makes clear, we need both the liberal framework and the democracy, and bringing them back together is the greatest challenge of our time.”
—Los Angeles Times
“Extraordinary…provides a clear, concise, persuasive, and insightful account of the conditions that made liberal democracy work—and how the breakdown in those conditions is the source of the current crisis of democracy around the world.”
—The Guardian
Reviews
Yascha Mounk does a great job laying out the challenges our country is facing and how to confront the authoritarian right.
-- Van Jones New York Times
-- Van Jones New York Times
An acute analysis of the rise in populist nationalism and the challenges to democracy in our time. If you’ve not heard of Yascha Mounk before, you definitely will in the future.
-- Francis Fukuyama
-- Francis Fukuyama
Brilliant… Mounk’s argument takes us back full circle to the trepidations of the Founders, who empowered the people to select their own leaders but whose ultimate authority would be mediated and constrained by independent forces within a constitutional framework. As this superb book makes clear, we need both the liberal framework and the democracy, and bringing them back together is the greatest challenge of our time. The last 68 pages describe what we can do to pull ourselves back from the brink…take notes and start your to-do list. It’s important.
-- Mickey Edwards Los Angeles Times
-- Mickey Edwards Los Angeles Times
Democracy is going through its worst crisis since the 1930s. The number of countries that can plausibly be described as democracies is shrinking. Strongmen are in power in several countries that once looked as if they were democratizing, notably Russia, Turkey and Egypt. The United States—the engine room of democratization for most of the post-war period—has a president who taunted his opponent with chants of ‘lock her up’ and refused to say if he would accept the result of the election if it went against him. But what exactly is the nature of this crisis? And what is driving it? Yascha Mounk’s The People vs. Democracy stands out in a crowded field for the quality of its answers to these questions. Mounk provides an admirable mixture of academic expertise and political sense… A chastening read for all sorts of reasons.
-- The Economist
-- The Economist
One of the many things to recommend this clarifying book is its international scope. As much as Donald J. Trump might fancy himself one of a kind, Mounk argues that the American president is part of a global wave. Populist forces are surging in Britain, Germany, Italy and France; in places like Venezuela, Hungary, Turkey and Poland they have already settled in, set up house and gotten around to the next step: gutting institutional safeguards in order to shore up their rule.
-- New York Times
-- New York Times
Mounk’s extraordinary new book…provides a clear, concise, persuasive, and insightful account of the conditions that made liberal democracy work—and how the breakdown in those conditions is the source of the current crisis of democracy around the world.
-- The Guardian
-- The Guardian
A trenchant survey from 1989, with its democratic euphoria, to the current map of autocratic striving… Mounk…points out that one reason for the increasing indifference to democratic rule and the rising enthusiasm for authoritarian alternatives, particularly among young people, is the widening historical distance from any direct experience of the horrors of German Fascism or Soviet Communism.
-- David Remnick New Yorker
-- David Remnick New Yorker
Mounk, who writes with great verve and clarity, makes good use of survey data to illustrate the declining support for democracy across the west. He pours cold water on the idea that idealistic young people will prove to be the saviors of democracy. On the contrary, less than a third of millennials in America believe that it is extremely important to live in a democracy, compared to over two-thirds of older Americans… Mounk’s analysis of the strains within liberal democracy is acute and revealing.
-- Gideon Rachman Financial Times
-- Gideon Rachman Financial Times
The comprehensiveness of Mounk’s analysis of populism’s advance is valuable, helping get beyond narratives that focus on a few especially colorful or nasty political figures or movements.
-- Thomas Carothers Washington Post
-- Thomas Carothers Washington Post
[Mounk’s] book provides important insights into the present political moment.
-- Ari Berman New York Times Book Review
-- Ari Berman New York Times Book Review
According to Yascha Mounk, the tide that washed Donald Trump into the White House has been rising for decades, over much of the world, and it may not leave our form of democracy standing… Mounk convincingly explains the populist storm surge and suggests ways in which we might arrange democracy’s sandbags.
-- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
-- Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Yascha Mounk mounts a powerful argument that liberal democracy stands at a critical point. He shows that the forces of technology, economics, and identity are pulling our political systems toward one of two highly undesirable extremes: illiberal democracies run by populist demagogues and undemocratic liberalisms governed by technocratic elites. He points us wisely toward a domesticated, inclusive nationalism and a renewed civic faith. An important book that should be read widely.
-- Dani Rodrik, Harvard University
-- Dani Rodrik, Harvard University
Mounk convincingly argues that democracy and liberalism are not synonymous and that in the face of uneven growth and a multicultural world, friction (or worse) between the two concepts is now almost predictable. The People vs. Democracy delivers a clear-eyed take on how liberal democracy fell out of favor in swaths of the Anglosphere and elsewhere.
-- Lloyd Green The Guardian
-- Lloyd Green The Guardian
[An] important new book.
-- E. J. Dionne, Jr. Washington Post
-- E. J. Dionne, Jr. Washington Post
Why is it that strong leaders, who have come to hold the highest political office through free and fair elections, are today kindling anxieties of authoritarianism? In the very readable and engaging book The People vs. Democracy, Harvard political theorist Yascha Mounk offers a compelling account of the phenomenon of populism, explains its causes and proposes remedies… It is in describing the impetus for the crisis of liberal democracy that Mounk is at his sparkling best.
-- Niraja Gopal Jayal The Wire
-- Niraja Gopal Jayal The Wire
To state the obvious, the past year has created a sense of distrust and fatigue between some American citizens and the government. Mounk attempts to identify what has driven citizens to despise politics and what politicians need do to reverse the trend before democracy is irrevocably lost.
-- Entertainment Weekly
-- Entertainment Weekly
Provocative reading…and food for thought for anyone with an interest in political trends.
-- Kirkus Reviews
-- Kirkus Reviews
[A] new and important book… The value of Mounk’s book is to highlight the importance of both of liberal democracy’s constitutive terms. We need restraints on the exercise of political power to prevent majorities (or those in power) from riding roughshod over the rights of minorities (or those not in power). But we also need public policy to be responsive and accountable to the preferences of the electorate.
-- Dani Rodrik Project Syndicate
-- Dani Rodrik Project Syndicate
[A] timely new book… [Mounk’s] argument is insightful and powerfully made and warrants significant consideration…Mounk’s book is an unshrinking and badly needed defense of liberalism.
-- Jerrod A. Laber Quillette
-- Jerrod A. Laber Quillette
We can no longer assume that liberal democracy is the wave of the future. This splendid book is an invaluable contribution to the debate about what ails democracy, and what can be done about it.
-- Michael J. Sandel, author of Justice
-- Michael J. Sandel, author of Justice
Everyone worried about the state of contemporary politics should read this book.
-- Anne-Marie Slaughter, President & CEO, New America
-- Anne-Marie Slaughter, President & CEO, New America
Lately, there has been a flurry of books on democracy but few are as pithy, readable, well-researched and thought-provoking as this one.
-- Udit Misra Business Standard
-- Udit Misra Business Standard
There is a lot that is important in this book…In [Mounk’s] up-close conversations with nativist right-wingers, as well as his extensive analysis of the research done in this area, he puts his fingers on the pulse of this emerging, and increasingly politically important, worldview…Mounk’s analysis of the rise of illiberal democracy is powerful. His reading is grounded in serious empirical study he has done himself, a thorough reading of the existing scholarly literature, as well as a deeply insightful analysis of his own.
-- Cynthia Kaufman Common Dreams
-- Cynthia Kaufman Common Dreams
Perhaps the year’s scariest read… It’s an excellent book.
-- Ezra Klein The Ezra Klein Show
-- Ezra Klein The Ezra Klein Show
[An] important new book.
-- Dambisa Moyo Globe and Mail
-- Dambisa Moyo Globe and Mail
What explains this lurch toward authoritarian populism? Yascha Mounk’s carefully researched and lucidly written book provides some answers and also spells out possible strategies to stem this tide.
-- Sumit Ganguly India Today
-- Sumit Ganguly India Today
This clear and pragmatic guide is about a global problem.
-- Mary Kaye Schilling Newsweek
-- Mary Kaye Schilling Newsweek
This book is a recent addition to the increasing volume of work on the rise of populism and the threats to democracy and is likely to be among the most influential. Mounk convincingly traces the retreat of liberal democracy to three factors: stagnating living standards, the rise of multi-ethnicity and the force of social media…In spite of the scale of current challenges to democracy, Mounk suggests that domesticating nationalism, reforming the economy and renewing civic faith should go a long way towards saving liberal democracy.
-- Gulcin Ozkan Times Higher Education
-- Gulcin Ozkan Times Higher Education
Mounk argues that liberal democracy…is decomposing into warped incarnations of its constituent elements: illiberal democracy and undemocratic liberalism…In his book’s scariest section, Mounk relates research showing, among other antidemocratic attitudes, that the percentage of Americans who say they have a favorable opinion of military rule has increased from one in 16 in 1995 to one in six in 2011.
-- Ezra Klein Vox
-- Ezra Klein Vox
Topics
-
Download PDFPublicly Available
Frontmatter
i -
Download PDFPublicly Available
Contents
v -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Introduction: Losing Our Illusions
1 - Part One. The Crisis of Liberal Democracy
-
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Democracy without Rights
23 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Rights without Democracy
53 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Democracy Is Deconsolidating
99 - Part Two. Origins
-
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Social Media
137 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Economic Stagnation
151 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Identity
161 - Part Three. Remedies
-
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Domesticating Nationalism
195 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Fixing the Economy
216 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Renewing Civic Faith
237 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Conclusion. Fighting for Our Convictions
253 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Notes
269 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Credits
358 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Acknowledgments
362 -
Requires Authentication UnlicensedLicensed
Index
371
Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
September 10, 2018
eBook ISBN:
9780674984776
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook ISBN:
9780674984776
Keywords for this book
populism; Authoritarianism; Dictatorship; Autocracy; Egalitarianism; elections; Illiberal democracy; Individual rights; Liberalism; Political parties; civil rights
