Democracy for Sale: Dark Money and Dirty Politics

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Antiquated electoral laws are broken with impunity, secretive lobbying is bending our politics out of shape and Silicon Valley tech giants collude in selling out democracy. If you're concerned about the health of British democracy, read this book - it is thorough, gripping and vitally important' Oliver Bullough, author of Moneyland. Remarkable’ Observer, Book of the Week Democracy is in crisis, and unaccountable and untraceable flows of money are helping to destroy it. The combination of unaccountable, unreported dark money and its use to create targeted (and contradictory) political messages for individuals and groups means that we have no way of knowing how free and fair our elections have become.

We are experiencing delays with deliveries to many countries, but in most cases local services have now resumed. It’s a great case study in how ruling elites can be infected with policy ideas and programmes via those “second-hand traders in ideas” of whom Hayek spoke so eloquently: academics, thinktanks and media commentators.Donald Trump, Boris Johnson, Jair Bolsonaro and populists in many other countries are the beneficiaries. Peter Geoghegan is a diligent, brilliant guide through the shadowy world of dark money and digital disinformation stretching from Westminster to Washington, and far beyond. Remainers will probably read Geoghegan’s account of this manoeuvring by Brexiters as further evidence that the Brexit vote was invalid. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.

ACT Contact / FAQ About Events / Videos Merch / Subs Sign in/up Democracy For Sale : Dark Money and Dirty Politics Geoghegan, Peter More by this author. It is accepted by you that Daunt Books has no control over additional charges in relation to customs clearance. This is the story of how money, vested interests and digital skulduggery are eroding trust in democracy.The _ga cookie, installed by Google Analytics, calculates visitor, session and campaign data and also keeps track of site usage for the site's analytics report. And in the UK, Martin Moore’s landmark study Democracy Hacked showed how, in the space of just one election cycle, authoritarian governments, wealthy elites and fringe hackers figured out how to game elections, bypass democratic processes and turn social networks into battlefields. He investigates politicians, fabulously well-funded partisan think tanks, propagandists who know how to game a rigged system, and the campaigners and regulators valiantly trying to stop them. Praise for Democracy for Sale: ‘Thorough, gripping and vitally important’ Oliver Bullough‘A brilliant description of the dark underbelly of modern democracy. These threats to democracy have, for decades, been visible to anyone disposed to look for them’: Boris Johnson in 2019.

Democracy for Sale is a diligent, brilliant guide through a shadowy world of dark money and digital disinformation stretching from Westminster to Washington, and far beyond. One of the most depressing parts of this narrative is the bland indifference of most mainstream UK media to these scandalous events. Politicians lie gleefully, making wild claims that can be shared instantly with millions of people on social media. Democracy for Sale is the story of how money, vested interests and digital skulduggery are eroding trust in democracy - and a powerful account of what must be done about it. Instead, the referendum and its aftermath have revealed something far more fundamental and systemic.And it has been able to do this in what has turned out to be a regulatory vacuum – with laws, penalties and overseeing authorities that are no longer fit for purpose. The first is the massive concentration of corporate power and private wealth that’s been under way since the 1970s, together with a corresponding increase in inequality, social exclusion and polarisation in most western societies; the second is the astonishing penetration of “dark money” into democratic politics; and the third is the revolutionary transformation of the information ecosystem in which democratic politics is conducted – a transformation that has rendered the laws that supposedly regulated elections entirely irrelevant to modern conditions. Photograph: Frank Augstein/Pool/Reuters View image in fullscreen ‘These threats to democracy have, for decades, been visible to anyone disposed to look for them’: Boris Johnson in 2019. That’s why those who see in the current difficulties of liberal democracies the stirrings of past monsters – Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, to name just three – are always looking in the wrong place. Politicians lie gleefully, making wild claims that can be shared instantly with millions on social media.