The United States has long been associated with liberal principles, but the nation has also nurtured deep pockets of authoritarianism. With a broad angle of vision across the past century, McGirr teases out the leaders, movements, and regional strong-holds of an American authoritarian tradition. She excavates the historical conditions that have fueled these movements, arguing that the growing power of authoritarianism within the Republican Party poses an urgent peril to the United States as a pluralist and multiracial democracy.

Lisa McGirr MA MPhil PhD Columbia, Charles Warren Professor of American History at Harvard University, has been appointed Harold Vyvyan Harmsworth Visiting Professor of American History in the Faculty of History and Rothermere American Institute, in association with The Queen’s College, Oxford, for one year from 1 October 2024.