Anne Applebaum

Gone are the days when just one bad guy ran an autocracy; now, sophisticated networks prop up autocratic leaders and encourage a move away from democracy.

Celebrated historian and journalist Anne Applebaum has tracked the slide away from democracy for decades, and in her new book Autocracy, Inc takes a look at how financial structures, security services and technological experts providing surveillance, propaganda and disinformation are essential to autocracies.

From Russia to North Korea and Syria, Applebaum takes us on a tour of autocracies around the world, and explains how they operate like giant companies.

An essential event for anyone interested in the world we’re living in and what the future looks like for our governments.

Applebaum is the author of books including Gulag: A History, which won the Pulitzer Prize. She is a columnist for the Atlantic and a senior fellow at Johns Hopkins University.