On Tyranny is not a scholarly book in the usual sense. In addition to its modest size, it lacks footnotes, a bibliography, illustrations, or even an index. However, its author's scholarly credentials are impeccable. Timothy Snyder is the Housum Professor of History at Yale University, and the author, co-author, or editor of twelve earlier books on twentieth-century history in general, and totalitarianism and the Holocaust in particular. On Tyranny offers the general public a brief essay on how autocratic and totalitarian regimes came to power in the twentieth century despite their lacking popular majorities. Perhaps of greater importance, he outlines what we, as American citizens, must watch for to prevent a similar disaster from occurring in our country.
Snyder does not hesitate to break the taboo about comparing an American politician with past autocrats including Adolf Hitler. Americans today, he believes, are fundamentally no wiser in preventing autocrats from seizing power than the people in Central and Eastern Europe after the two world wars and following the collapse of the Soviet Union. Americans are just as inclined, as were Germans, including German Jews in 1933, in believing that checks and balances will prevent all-out authoritarian rule. Indeed, he fears that as memories of Fascist and Communist regimes fade, the more vulnerable Americans will be to the blandishments of autocrats offering simplistic solutions to complex economic and social problems.
Specialists in Austrian history will see no mention of Hitler's Austrian childhood, the rise of the Austrian Nazi Party, or even the country's homegrown antisemitism. However, Snyder does single out Austria for its “anticipatory obedience,” that is the willingness of many Austrians to actively join in the humiliation of their Jewish fellow citizens. Snyder believes that this passivity and compliance convinced Hitler that he need not fear a popular reaction to similar acts in Germany.
Anticipatory obedience is just one example of what benefited autocrats on their road to tyrannical power. Equally helpful were compliant civil servants, and businessmen seeking cheap labor. Lawyers were willing to allow laws to facilitate conquests and destruction rather than to prevent them. More generally, autocrats exploited people who preferred creative myths to historical facts.
The inability to distinguish between myth and reality, and facts from fiction, is just one parallel the author finds between Donald Trump and the autocratic dictators of the twentieth century. Trump, like Hitler and Mussolini, did not hesitate to expel opponents from his rallies during his presidential campaign and even encouraged his audiences to remove anyone who expressed differing opinions. Twentieth-century dictators were already adept at constructing “alternative realities.” They were also skillful at using new media—in their case the radio—as a means of attracting potential supporters and arousing hostility toward their country's real or imagined foreign and domestic enemies. The dictators also shared with Trump a hatred of the established media. And like Trump they had no difficulty in promising all things to all people including promises that were contradictory.
On Tyranny shares the fears of the Founding Fathers of a “usurpation of power by a single individual or group or the circumvention of law by rulers for their own benefit” (10). Such a development is not implausible, Snyder maintains, because our system of checks and balances has rarely faced a situation in which the less popular of two parties has control of all three branches of government along with a majority of statehouses.
To prevent such a disaster Snyder offers twenty recommendations, each one the subject of a brief chapter. To separate fact from fiction, he suggests relying on books and long articles rather than the internet. One should spend time researching and writing even though they require hard work. Good citizens should participate in nongovernmental organizations and charities, the very things that the totalitarian dictators hated and sought to control. Americans should be wary of how terms like “extremism” and “terrorism” are used. They should keep up or establish friendships abroad, and make sure that they have a passport. Perhaps most importantly, Americans should beware of how a government might exploit an act of terrorism—much as Hitler did after the Reichstag fire in March 1933—to destroy our democratic institutions. “History [Snyder concludes] allows us to see patterns and make judgments … [It] gives us the company of those who have done and suffered more than we have” (125).
My only regret about On Tyranny is that it is not many times longer. Its short length and modest format were barely enough to hint at the characteristics of tyranny and the dangers it presents. To be fair, however, On Tyranny makes no claim to be comprehensive or definitive. It is far more a warning directed at a broad audience than a scholarly treatise. As such, it succeeds very well.
