“There's no checklist of how democracies fail because they fail in different ways. Some of them fail because they break up and civil war breaks out... Often they fail because someone is elected to power who doesn't respect the rules of the democracy.”

American journalist, historian and foreign-policy commentator

Anne Elizabeth Applebaum is an American journalist, historian, and foreign-policy commentator. She has worked on the politics and history of Europe, and in 2013 became a Polish citizen. She is known for writing about Communism and the growth of civil society in Central and Eastern Europe. Her work often focuses on the region’s political changes and the ideas that shaped them.