On January 4, 2023, Israel’s Minister of Justice convened a press conference to announce the launch of a ‘governance reform’. The plan was presented as a unique solution to a specific Israeli crisis of governance. In reality, however, it was a textbook adoption of a pattern already seen in Poland and Hungary. Tellingly, Poland’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Paweł Jabłoński, later revealed that the Netanyahu government had consulted with his officials on the eve of the plan’s launch.

Countless books and articles have been written about the rise of populist regimes – their trends, methods, and rhetoric. Yet, Noam Gidron and Yaniv Roznai’s book, Democracy in Retreat: Populism, Polarization, and the Regime Overthrow, is undoubtedly one of the finest. Its uniqueness lies not only in its clarity but in its presentation of the Israeli experience as part of a global populist wave sweeping the world, from India to Poland and from Venezuela to Hungary. This comparative discussion clarifies the method and the true goal hidden behind the misleading title of ‘governance reform’ – a plan presented to the public as a supreme necessity where ‘the sky is the limit’.

The first part of the book describes the general populist doctrine. Essentially, it is a narrow and hollow worldview that sees politics as a battlefield between ‘the real people’ and ‘traitorous elites’ who supposedly plot to thwart the people’s will. These elites – embodied by the judiciary, legal gatekeepers, the free press, and civil society – are portrayed as a ‘Deep State’ intentionally undermining national goals. Opposite them stands the........

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