by Jill Lepore
First published 2026
Jill Lepore examines how machine rule has transformed human existence in ways few historical shifts can match for speed and recklessness. Drawing inspiration from Hannah Arendt's 1951 analysis of how modern machinery reshaped human fundamentals, Lepore tracks our growing dependence on data systems that now strangle democratic life. Political campaigns operate as attention mining algorithms flooded with fake bots. Multinational media corporations control public conversation. Billionaire technocrats wielding AI tools replace the liberal nation state with autocratic systems. Digital citizen assemblies let artificial intelligence recommend actions to humans instead of elected legislatures. This technological corrosion of global democracy destroys both human community and self governance capacity while devastating wildlife habitat and biodiversity. Yet Lepore argues nothing about this artificial state was inevitable. She demonstrates that other destructive systems like feudalism, fascism, and slavery were dismantled once people identified their parts and traced their sources. Her book provides that new historical framework for understanding and potentially dismantling machine rule.
Genres: political-science, non-fiction, technology, 21st-century, artificial-intelligence, current-affairs
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: investigative-journalism, social-commentary
Period: 21st Century
336 pages · Hardcover · Liveright