HOW TO LOSE A COUNTRY

She heard reasonable people in America say it the night Trump's election was soundtracked by chants of `Build that wall.' She heard reasonable people in Turkey say it as Erdogan rigged elections, rebuilt the economy around cronyism, and labelled his opposition as terrorists. How to Lose a Country is an impassioned plea, a warning to the world that populism and nationalism don't march fully-formed into government; they creep. Award winning author and journalist Ece Temelkuran, identifies the early-warning signs of this phenomenon, sprouting up across the world from Eastern Europe to South America, in order to define a global pattern, and arm the reader with the tools to root it out. Proposing alternative, global answers to the pressing - and too often paralysing - poltical questions of our time, Temelkuran explores the insidious idea of `real people', the infantilisation of language and debate, the way laughter can prove a false friend, and the dangers of underestimating one's opponent. She weaves memoir, history and clear-sighted argument into an urgent and eloquent defence of democracy. No longer can the reasonable comfort themselves with `it couldn't happen here.' It is happening. And soon it may be too late.