However, a military coup is not the only way to subvert a democracy. An invasion by a foreign power, the ouster of a regime by a rebel force, or assassinations, all of these are recognised threats. 

But there is increasing evidence of a new threat—which I examine in this book—and this one comes from within: the subversion of democracy by the ruling elite of the country.

Across the world, this is the most common reason that democracies descend into autocracies, as was seen in Singapore when Lee Kuan Yew imposed a one-party rule, or in Venezuela when President Nicolas Maduro won through a disputed election. India saw a similar subversion of democracy between 1975 and 1977, when Indira Gandhi declared the Emergency.


While analysing the reasons for such subversions, a critical question remains inadequately addressed: how can a person or a small coterie of influential people, stationed mostly in a single city, unsettle democratic institutions, intimidate millions into silence across hundreds of thousands of square kilometres, send thousands to jail, terrorise its business class into supporting it, smear its rivals and critics, bully the media into becoming its propaganda arm, convert the judiciary into a timid institution and silence even the most courageous of civil servants? Just a handful of people sitting in a city?