The Revenge of Power: How Autocrats Are Reinventing Politics for the 21st Century

by Moisés Naím

That’s why, in recent years, we have seen the success of a new breed of power-seekers: unconventional leaders who witnessed the decay of traditional power and realized that a radically new approach could open hitherto untapped opportunities. They have arisen all over the world, from the richest countries to the poorest, from the most institutionally sophisticated to the most backward. We have in mind here Donald Trump, of course, but also Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, the Philippines’ Rodrigo Duterte, India’s Narendra Modi, Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro, Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, El Salvador’s Nayib Bukele, and many others. This book dissects their approach because one cannot defeat what one cannot understand.