How Democracies Die

The comparative study of democratic backsliding, and the moment it described has not passed. Levitsky and Ziblatt show that democracies now more often erode from within, through elected leaders who hollow out institutions, than fall to tanks in the street. They identify the warning signs and the guardrails, mutual toleration and forbearance, that keep a system upright. The book of the moment, and the moment continues. Read it for the warning signs, then watch for them.

A political scientist of comparative democracy, co-author of two of the most widely read recent books on democratic decline. How Democracies Die argues that democracies now more often erode from within, through elected leaders, than fall to coups. Tyranny of the Minority examines how institutional rules can let a political minority govern against the majority. He studies backsliding as a process with warning signs.