Ruth Ben-Ghiat’s Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present could not be more relevant. Authoritarian rule has wreaked destruction around the world. I picked up this book to read a historical analysis of Trump, among other autocrats and dictators, but found myself educated on much more than my corner of the world. Ben-Ghiat writes from a transhistorical perspective. From the introduction: “Strongmen argues that today’s leaders….have deeper roots. They recycle rhetoric and actions that go back to the dawn of authoritarianism in the 1920s and are invested […]