Overview
From a great writerālegendary for his expeditions into some of the worldās most forbidding placesāa wise, honest, and sometimes absurdist memoir of aĀ mostĀ remarkable journey through British politics at the breaking point
Rory Stewart was an unlikely politician. He was best known for his two-year walk across Asiaāin which he crossed Afghanistan, essentially solo, in the months after 9/11āand for his service, as a diplomat in Iraq, and Afghanistan. But in 2009, he abandoned his chair at Harvard University to stand for a seat in Parliament, representing the communities and farms of the Lake District and the Scottish borderāone of the most isolated and beautiful districts in England. He ran as a Conservative, though he had no prior connection to the politics and there was much about the party that he disagreed with.
How Not to Be a Politician is a candid and penetrating examination of life on the ground as a politician in an age of shallow populism, when every hard problem has a solution thatās simple, appealing, and wrong. While undauntedly optimistic about what a public servant can accomplish in the lives of his constituents, the book is also a pitiless insiderās exposĆ© of the game of politics at the highest level, often shocking in its displays of rampant cynicism, ignorance, glibness, and sheer incompetence. Stewart witnesses Britainās vote to leave the European Union and its descent into political civil war, compounded by the bad faith of his partyās leadersāDavid Cameron, Boris Johnson, and Liz Truss.
Finally, after nine years of service and six ministerial roles, and shocked by his partyās lurch to the populist right, Stewart ran for prime minister. Stewartās campaign took him into the lead in the opinion polls, head-to-head against Boris Johnson. How Not to Be a Politician is his effort to make sense of it all, including what has happened to politics in Britain and the world and how we can fix it. The view into democracyās dark heart is troubling, but at every turn Stewart also finds allies and ways to make a difference. A bracing, invigorating mix of irony and love infuses How Not to Be a Politician. This is one of the most revealing memoirs written by a politician in living memory.
This book title, How Not to Be a Politician (A Memoir), ISBN: 9780593300329, by Rory Stewart, published by Penguin Publishing Group (September 19, 2023) is available in hardcover. Our minimum order quantity is 25 copies. All standard bulk book orders ship FREE in the continental USA and delivered in 4-10 business days.
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