crafalsk264 's review for:

On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder

3.5

challenging dark informative reflective slow-paced

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This book takes a close look at the development of tyranny as it appears in the morning news

and the execution of catastrophic policies. With Twenty Lessons, Snyder draws from the darkest hours of the twentieth century to provide hope for the twenty-first. As he writes, “Americans are no wiser than the Europeans who saw democracy yield to fascism, Nazism and communism. Our one advantage is that we might learn from their experience.”

Twenty Lessons is a call to arms and a guide to resistance, with invaluable ideas for how we can preserve our freedoms in the uncertain years to come. Snyder’s examination of the political, economic and social circumstances that combine to create a breeding ground for those willing to adopt the fascist ideology. I found this short book to be an intelligent, thoughtful and in depth examination of the issues being faced by governments in danger of being susceptible to the ideology threatening adoption of tyranny.

I recommend to readers of nonfiction, history, politics, philosophy, sociology, social justice.