Summary of Ben Rhodes's After the Fall (Unabridged‪)‬

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America’s way of doing things, from global capitalism to liberal democracy, has fallen out of fashion.

After the Fall (2021) by Ben Rhodes discusses the unprecedented failure of the United States to capitalize as the world’s leading force following the Cold War. Today, countries such as Hungary and Russia are dispelling the Western outlook on free business and politics and instead committing to outright authoritarianism. Dictators including Vladamir Putin, Victor Orban, and Xi Jinping use wide-scale corruption to consolidate power, extreme nationalism to create a strong national identity built on persecuting others, and technology to surveille and control their citizens. Because America failed to provide a better example of capitalism and democracy, other countries are starting to look to examples like China. The danger of these authoritarian governments is how they look to upend democratic thought altogether, by any means necessary.