Ctrl Alt Delete: How Politics and the Media Crashed Our Democracy (Hardback)

Tom Baldwin (author)

£25.00

Hardback Published: 19/07/2018

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Synopsis

Something has gone badly wrong: people loathe politicians, distrust the press and increasingly fear each other. It's easy to blame Russian trolls, Facebook news feeds, or the sinister manipulation of 'big data' - but these are all symptoms of an abusive thirty-year relationship between politics, the media, and a new information age.

Interviewing everyone from Tony Blair to Michael Gove, top journalists to Russian bloggers, and tech giant execs to online activists, Tom Baldwin describes a vicious battle for control of the news agenda, at the expense of public trust and the value of truth.

He shows how technological change has hollowed out space for virulent new populist alternatives, including the so-called 'alt-right' and 'alt-left'. And he warns that not only extremists, but also the progressive centre, may now decide to press 'delete' on liberal democracy altogether.

Ctrl Alt Delete is a brutally honest and sometimes funny account of how our democracy was crashed - and whether we can still re-boot it.

Publisher: C Hurst & Co Publishers Ltd
ISBN: 9781787380066
Dimensions: 216 x 138 mm

MEDIA REVIEWS

'An account of an increasingly abusive relationship with the truth is lucid, punchy and often funny.' - The Observer

'A well written, often funny, sometimes elegaic and occasionally angry musing on how the worlds of politics and the media have been changed for the worse in the past decade.' - The Times

'The sometimes hilarious, often tragic and always gripping story of how freedom of expression in press, broadcast and new media has become an increasingly wobbly foundation for our democracy and way of life. Tom Baldwin has written an important book.' - Robert Peston

'Written with characteristic gusto and insight, this is a no-holds-barred indictment of the democratic and civic crisis we face today.' - Tristram Hunt

'Trenchant, wise and full of first-hand accounts of the weirdness of modern media and politics. This timely reminder that democracy is not yet lost fizzes with optimism and energy -- but warns that time is running out.' - Justin Webb