The Midnight Kingdom: A History of Power, Paranoia, and the Coming Crisis

To observers reassured about the health of American democracy after the 2022 U.S. midterm elections, Jared Yates Sexton's blunt and provocative The Midnight Kingdom may come as an unwelcome splash of cold water. In this survey of the history of Western civilization that begins in first-century Rome and spans nearly 2,000 years, Sexton, a political analyst and podcaster, explores "the means by which power shields and hides itself." He argues that it does so chiefly through deceit and paranoia-inducing conspiracy theories that have remained remarkably consistent across cultures and historical eras, and that those tactics are flourishing with particular virulence today. 

In the 20th century, Sexton's principal bogeyman is neoliberalism, a philosophy that in the United States has been "eating away at the authority of the state, systematically transferring power from the federal government to the domain of the market and corporations." The consequence of its dominance, he contends, has been to create a permanent underclass whose rage can be deflected from its true oppressors while providing the political support necessary to maintain those oppressors in power.

In crisp and efficient prose, he discourses on subjects as diverse as the power of the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages, the age of colonialism, or 20th-century American politics. His opinions will elicit enthusiastic assent from some readers and vigorous disagreement from others. No one reading this book would ever accuse him of unwarranted optimism, but he does envision "a new faith that transcends the divisions of old and centers on a belief and trust in one another." The outcome of this clash will shape the next turn of history's wheel. --Harvey Freedenberg, freelance reviewer

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