The Friendly Dictatorship

The Friendly Dictatorship
Author: Jeffrey Simpson
Publisher: McClelland & Stewart
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2011-01-14
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1551994437

Is Canada a dictatorship – albeit a friendly dictatorship? In this thoughtful book, Jeffrey Simpson argues that the Liberal Party’s re-election to a third majority government must raise the question: Is Canada in danger of becoming a de facto one-party state, ruled by an all-powerful leader? An effective parliamentary system presumes that at least one party is ready and capable of replacing the existing government by winning an election. Clearly, no party was ready in the last election, and none of the opposition parties absorbed the lessons of Canadian political history, that the Liberals can only be defeated by coalitions that show a preference for moderation and compromise. The recent election results have left the Liberals in power for the foreseeable future. Jean Chrétien’s longevity and reluctance to step down has highlighted the most alarming part of Canada’s de facto one-party government: Canadian parliamentary democracy now places more power in the hands of the prime minister than does any other democracy. Chrétien, who has survived and thrived so long in this political system, is the last person from whom anyone should expect an interest in reform. At the same time, Canadians’ increasing discouragement over their political system can be seen in a declining voter turnout, a documented erosion in respect for all politicians, and in an increasing interest in other forms of political engagement as opposed to organized partisan politics. The Friendly Dictatorship demonstrates what has been happening in three areas that are vital to Canadian democracy: the parliamentary system, the political parties, and the electorate. What has occurred within each of these spheres has directly influenced developments in the others, and the combined effect has been to leave Canadian democracy in a worrying state. The Friendly Dictatorship delivers a message that is informed, articulate, and passionate, and that should be heard by all Canadians.

Making the World Safe for Dictatorship

Making the World Safe for Dictatorship
Author: Alexander Dukalskis
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 265
Release: 2021-04-06
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0197520154

Authoritarian states work hard to manage their images abroad. They invest in foreign-facing media, hire public relations firms, tout their popular celebrities, and showcase their successes to elite and popular foreign audiences. However, there is a dark side to these efforts that is sometimes overlooked. Authoritarian states try to obscure or censor bad news about their governments and often discredit their critics abroad. In extreme cases, authoritarian states intimidate, physically attack, or even murder their opponents overseas. All states attempt to manage their global image to some degree, but authoritarian states in the post-Cold War era have special incentives to do so given the predominance of democracy as an international norm. This book is about how authoritarian states manage their image abroad using both "promotional" tactics of persuasion and "obstructive" tactics of repression. Alexander Dukalskis looks at the tactics that authoritarian states use for image management and the ways in which their strategies vary from one state to another. Moreover, Dukalskis looks at the degree to which some authoritarian states succeed in using image management to enhance their internal and external security, and, in turn, to make their world safe for dictatorship. Making the World Safe for Dictatorship uses a diverse array of data, including interviews, cross-national data on extraterritorial repression, examination of public relations filings with the United States government, analysis of authoritarian propaganda, media frequency analysis, and speeches and statements by authoritarian leaders. Dukalskis also builds a new dataset--the Authoritarian Actions Abroad Database--that uses publicly available information to categorize nearly 1,200 instances in which authoritarian states repressed their critical exiles abroad, ranging from vague threats to confirmed assassinations. The book looks closely at three cases, China, North Korea, and Rwanda, to understand in more detail how authoritarian states manage their image abroad using combinations of promotional and obstructive tactics. The result is a new way of thinking about the international dimensions of authoritarian politics.

The Benevolent Dictator

The Benevolent Dictator
Author: Michael Feuer
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 292
Release: 2011-05-09
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1118061543

An unconventional philosophy for starting and building a business that exceeds your own expectations What does it require to take a concept rapidly and effectively from mind to market? The Benevolent Dictator recognizes that entrepreneurship is a gauntlet. Those who succeed are benevolent dictators—able to make the intricate process happen in days, weeks and months to win. The Benevolent Dictator gives you no-nonsense how-to advice and examples that have worked. This non-traditional, gung-ho guide is not afraid to lay out the leadership methods that can effectively get a new business off the ground, and through the requisite fast-track growth phases that produce tangible success measured by your bottom line and your wallet. Learn critical specifics on how to move from idea development to build-out, through steps for continuous improvement, and on to the big cash out Features proven tools, strategies, and tactics that will help you bottle entrepreneurial lightning over and over again As the cofounder of office retail giant OfficeMax, the author turned a $3 million investment into a $1.5 billion sale in his 16 years as CEO Beating the competition is never easy. For those times when you need an iron hand, then you also need the wisdom to know when and how to use it. Whether you're a business student, aspiring entrepreneur, or a practicing executive, you need to discover the winning ways of The Benevolent Dictator.

The Dictatorship of Woke Capital

The Dictatorship of Woke Capital
Author: Stephen R. Soukup
Publisher: Encounter Books
Total Pages: 167
Release: 2021-02-23
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1641771437

For the better part of a century, the Left has been waging a slow, methodical battle for control of the institutions of Western civilization. During most of that time, “business”— and American Big Business, in particular — remained the last redoubt for those who believe in free people, free markets, and the criticality of private property. Over the past two decades, however, that has changed, and the Left has taken its long march to the last remaining non-Leftist institution. Over the course of the past two years or so, a small handful of politicians on the Right — Senators Tom Cotton, Marco Rubio, and Josh Hawley, to name three — have begun to sense that something is wrong with American business and have sought to identify the problem and offer solutions to rectify it. While the attention of high-profile politicians to the issue is welcome, to date the solutions they have proposed are inadequate, for a variety of reasons, including a failure to grasp the scope of the problem, failure to understand the mechanisms of corporate governance, and an overreliance on state-imposed, top-down solutions. This book provides a comprehensive overview of the problem and the players involved, both on the aggressive, hardcharging Left and in the nascent conservative resistance. It explains what the Left is doing and how and why the Right must be prepared and willing to fight back to save this critical aspect of American culture from becoming another, more economically powerful version of the “woke” college campus.

Dictator

Dictator
Author: Robert Harris
Publisher: Random House
Total Pages: 546
Release: 2016-06-02
Genre: Historical fiction
ISBN: 0099474190

'Confirms Harris's undisputed place as our leading master of both the historical and contemporary thriller' Daily Mail There was a time when Cicero held Caesar's life in the palm of his hand. But now Caesar is the dominant figure and Cicero's life is in ruins. Cicero's comeback requires wit, skill and courage. And for a brief and glorious period, the legendary orator is once more the supreme senator in Rome. But politics is never static. And no statesman, however cunning, can safeguard against the ambition and corruption of others. 'The finest fictional treatment of Ancient Rome in the English language' Scotsman

Dictators Without Borders

Dictators Without Borders
Author: Alexander A. Cooley
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 314
Release: 2017-02-07
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0300222092

A penetrating look into the unrecognized and unregulated links between autocratic regimes in Central Asia and centers of power and wealth throughout the West Weak, corrupt, and politically unstable, the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan are dismissed as isolated and irrelevant to the outside world. But are they? This hard-hitting book argues that Central Asia is in reality a globalization leader with extensive involvement in economics, politics and security dynamics beyond its borders. Yet Central Asia’s international activities are mostly hidden from view, with disturbing implications for world security. Based on years of research and involvement in the region, Alexander Cooley and John Heathershaw reveal how business networks, elite bank accounts, overseas courts, third-party brokers, and Western lawyers connect Central Asia’s supposedly isolated leaders with global power centers. The authors also uncover widespread Western participation in money laundering, bribery, foreign lobbying by autocratic governments, and the exploiting of legal loopholes within Central Asia. Riveting and important, this book exposes the global connections of a troubled region that must no longer be ignored.

The Specter of Dictatorship

The Specter of Dictatorship
Author: David M. Driesen
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Total Pages: 323
Release: 2021-07-20
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1503628620

Reveals how the U.S. Supreme Court's presidentialism threatens our democracy and what to do about it. Donald Trump's presidency made many Americans wonder whether our system of checks and balances would prove robust enough to withstand an onslaught from a despotic chief executive. In The Specter of Dictatorship, David Driesen analyzes the chief executive's role in the democratic decline of Hungary, Poland, and Turkey and argues that an insufficiently constrained presidency is one of the most important systemic threats to democracy. Driesen urges the U.S. to learn from the mistakes of these failing democracies. Their experiences suggest, Driesen shows, that the Court must eschew its reliance on and expansion of the "unitary executive theory" recently endorsed by the Court and apply a less deferential approach to presidential authority, invoked to protect national security and combat emergencies, than it has in recent years. Ultimately, Driesen argues that concern about loss of democracy should play a major role in the Court's jurisprudence, because loss of democracy can prove irreversible. As autocracy spreads throughout the world, maintaining our democracy has become an urgent matter.

The Dictator's Handbook

The Dictator's Handbook
Author: Bruce Bueno de Mesquita
Publisher: Public Affairs
Total Pages: 354
Release: 2011-09-27
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 161039044X

Explains the theory of political survival, particularly in cases of dictators and despotic governments, arguing that political leaders seek to stay in power using any means necessary, most commonly by attending to the interests of certain coalitions.

Dictatorship

Dictatorship
Author: Carl Schmitt
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 287
Release: 2015-01-28
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0745697143

Now available in English for the first time, Dictatorship is Carl Schmitt’s most scholarly book and arguably a paradigm for his entire work. Written shortly after the Russian Revolution and the First World War, Schmitt analyses the problem of the state of emergency and the power of the Reichspräsident in declaring it. Dictatorship, Schmitt argues, is a necessary legal institution in constitutional law and has been wrongly portrayed as just the arbitrary rule of a so-called dictator. Dictatorship is an essential book for understanding the work of Carl Schmitt and a major contribution to the modern theory of a democratic, constitutional state. And despite being written in the early part of the twentieth century, it speaks with remarkable prescience to our contemporary political concerns.

The Power of Silence

The Power of Silence
Author: Robert Sarah
Publisher: Ignatius Press
Total Pages: 249
Release: 2017-03-30
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1681497581

Now with a new afterword by Pope emeritus Benedict XVI! In a time when technology penetrates our lives in so many ways and materialism exerts such a powerful influence over us, Cardinal Robert Sarah presents a bold book about the strength of silence. The modern world generates so much noise, he says, that seeking moments of silence has become both harder and more necessary than ever before. Silence is the indispensable doorway to the divine, explains the cardinal in this profound conversation with Nicolas Diat. Within the hushed and hallowed walls of the La Grande Chartreux, the famous Carthusian monastery in the French Alps, Cardinal Sarah addresses the following questions: Can those who do not know silence ever attain truth, beauty, or love? Do not wisdom, artistic vision, and devotion spring from silence, where the voice of God is heard in the depths of the human heart? After the international success of God or Nothing, Cardinal Sarah seeks to restore to silence its place of honor and importance. "Silence is more important than any other human work," he says, "for it expresses God. The true revolution comes from silence; it leads us toward God and others so as to place ourselves humbly and generously at their service."