Big Caesars and Little Caesars

How They Rise and How They Fall - From Julius Caesar to Boris Johnson Ferdinand Mount

Caesarism is alive and well in this fascinating exploration of how and why Caesars seize power and why they fall.

There is a comforting illusion shared by historians and political commentators from Fukuyama back to Macaulay, Mill and Marx, that history progresses in a nice straight line towards liberal democracy or socialism, despite the odd hiccup.

In reality, every democracy, however sophisticated or stable it may look, has been attacked or actually destroyed by a would-be Caesar, from Ancient Greece to the present day.

There are Big Caesars who set out to achieve total social control and Little Caesars who merely want to run an agreeable kleptocracy without opposition: from Julius Caesar and Oliver Cromwell through Napoleon and Bolsonaro, to Mussolini, Salazar, De Gaulle, Boris Johnson and Trump.

The final part of this book describes how and why would-be Caesars come to grief, from the Gunpowder Plot to Trump’s march on the Capitol, and ends with a thoughtprovoking road map of the way back to constitutional government.

Ferdinand Mount was Editor of The Spectator and The Times Literary Review, and was head of Margaret Thatcher’s think­tank – The Number 10 Policy Unit.

His six-volume series of novels, A Chronicle of Modern Twilight, included Of Love And Asthma, which won the Hawthornden Prize for 1992. His most recent books are Kiss Myself Goodbye and the novel Making Nice.