How to Lose a Country is a warning to the world that populism and nationalism don't march fully-formed into government; they creep.

Award-winning author and journalist Ece Temelkuran identifies the early warning signs of this phenomenon, sprouting up across the world from Eastern Europe to South America, in order to arm the reader with the tools to recognise it and take action.

Weaving memoir, history and clear-sighted argument, Temelkuran proposes alternative answers to the pressing - and too often paralysing - political questions of our time. How to Lose a Country is an exploration of the insidious ideas at the core of these movements and an urgent, eloquent defence of democracy.

This 2024 edition includes a new foreword by the author.

About the Author

Ece Temelkuran is an award-winning Turkish novelist, a political thinker and a public speaker whose work has appeared in the Guardian, New York Times, Le Monde, La Stampa, New Statesman and Der Spiegel, among several international media outlets. She won the Edinburgh International Book Festival First Book award for her novel Women Who Blow on Knots and the Ambassador of New Europe Award for her book Turkey: The Insane and the Melancholy. She is the author of the internationally acclaimed book How to Lose a Country and her most recent book, Together, was shortlisted for the Terzani Award in Italy. She has twice been recognised as Turkey's most read political columnist, and twice rated as one of the ten most influential people on social media (with nearly three million followers).

ecetemelkuran.net | @ETemelkuran | @ece.temelkuran

Reviews
Highly readable and vibrates with outrage * * The Times * *
A brilliant analysis of how democracy can be starved to death. It's one of the most important books anyone could read at the moment, when public institutions are slowly being corrupted wherever we look -- PHILIP PULLMAN
This is essential -- MARGARET ATWOOD on Twitter
The burning topic of today: populism. Vivid, visionary, terrifyingly familiar, this book is essential reading for everyone on planet Earth -- ANDREW SEAN GREER
How to Lose a Country is a succinct and hard-hitting explainer on the rise of populism in Turkey and elsewhere, with a running refrain to western nations that consider themselves free from the threat of authoritarianism: this can happen to you * * Financial Times * *
This book is a fierce mapping of the preceding stages of dissolution. It begins with the creation of populist movements. [ . . . ] The intensity of the call for political engagement and the fluency of expression make this an urgent read. Those looking for such steadfastness should begin here * * Irish Times * *
Ece Temelkuran elegantly and wittily demolishes our most enduring and damaging political illusions. But she also cannily intuits and eloquently describes our deepest unmet needs for justice, peace and stability. Anyone rattled and disorientated by the political earthquakes of recent years ought to read her, and find solid ground again -- PANKAJ MISHRA
When I left government, the first thing I read was How to Lose a Country and I couldn't put it down. If you look at America from the outside in, it's much clearer than looking at it from the eye of the storm. To me, Ece's book remains the best guide to understanding the blend of right-wing populism and strongman authoritarianism that has metastasized around the world. Thanks to Ece's wise, accessible, personal and erudite book, I have been able to see much more clearly what's been happening to American democracy and to politics in so many countries around the world -- BEN RHODES
This is a keenly observed and passionately written book. Read it or be prepared to lose your country -- RABIH ALAMEDDINE
A stunning, sane and intimate chronicle of a world gone nuts. An urgent whisper in our ears about our modern dictators and their collaborators -- MOHAMMED HANIF



Book Information
ISBN 9781837263073
Author Ece Temelkuran
Format Paperback
Page Count 304
Imprint Canongate Canons
Publisher Canongate Books
Weight(grams) 212g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 129mm * 18mm