Anne Applebaum’s timely book Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World explains the rise of modern autocracy in terms of simple greed and shamelessness. It details the shift away from dictators even pretending to uphold the values that characterised the post-World War II international order – and the collaborative efforts being made to undermine these institutions and replace them with transactionalism and their own control.
Applebaum explains how façades of democracy have been successfully manipulated by those who seek to undermine it as a system. Discussing the “shock therapy” approach taken to economic transition, which planted the seeds for many of these elements in the former Soviet space, she notes the role of Western companies and shell companies, banks and financial institutions. These greased the wheels for kleptocractic superstructures while getting rich and enabling widening inequality.
One chapter criticises the role of media, social media and the technologies and algorithms that enable the erosion of trust with the rapid dissemination of mis- and disinformation. She also sketches out how autocrats are learning from one another in a manner that in many ways is more efficient and effective than anything being seen on the other side. For anyone living in and observing the political dynamics in the former Yugoslavia, everything outlined in her book seems extremely familiar and tangible.
The nexus of politics and power, and the predominant rol.
