How authoritarianism went from defense to offense on the world stage

The global rise of authoritarianism today is a puzzle: democracies were supposed to be immune to such impulses, but the current political landscape of countries as diverse as India, Hungary, and the United States show that they’re not. Why are we seeing a resurgence of authoritarianism? And why did it take so many experts by surprise? In this episode, Mark Blyth looks for answers to these questions with Alexander Cooley and Alex Dukalskis, authors of the new book Dictating the Agenda: The Authoritarian Resurgence in World Politics. In the book, they explore how authoritarian countries today project their ideologies around the world, and why their strategies may look eerily familiar to anyone who has studied the spread of western liberalism in the 1990s and 2000s. Guests on the episode: Alexander Cooley is a professor of political science at Barnard College. Alex Dukalskis is an associate professor in the School of Politics and International Relations at University College Dublin. Learn more about and purchase Dictating the Agenda The Authoritarian Resurgence in World Politics

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How authoritarianism went from defense to offense on the world stage is an episode from The Rhodes Center Podcast by Rhodes Center.

This episode is 36:46 long.

This episode was published on Feb 23, 2026.

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