100,000+ Books, Games & Puzzles in-stock πŸ‡³πŸ‡Ώ

Overnight NZ-wide delivery πŸš€ Thank you for supporting our 100% NZ-owned bookstore ❀️

How to Stand Up to a Dictator

Radio 4 Book of the Week
4.36 goodreads logo

Ratings/reviews counts are updated frequently.

Check link for latest rating.
( 5,491 ratings, 963 reviews)
Book Hero Magic crafted this summary to help describe this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Summary
How to Stand Up to a Dictator by Maria Ressa is a compelling exploration of the author's journey as a journalist facing authoritarian regimes and battling misinformation. It delves into her experiences in the Philippines, highlighting the challenges of defending a free press against the encroaching power of dictatorship and the influence of social media on contemporary politics. The book offers an inspiring testament to courage and resilience in the face of overwhelming odds.
Read More
Format: Paperback / softback
$3500
OVERNIGHT NZ-WIDE DELIVERY

Found a better price? Request a price match

Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?

You might enjoy this compelling narrative if you're intrigued by the intersection of journalism, technology, and politics. With insightful analysis and personal experiences, the author explores the challenges of defending democracy and press freedom in the modern age. It's an inspiring read for those passionate about social justice and active civic engagement.

Book Hero thinking about your next read

Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description

Inspirational 2021 Nobel Peace Prize WINNER Maria Ressa's personal frontline manifesto in the war against authoritarianism's sinister uses of big tech.

BBC RADIO 4 START OF THE WEEK and GUARDIAN BOOK OF THE YEAR

WINNER OF THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE 2021

What will you sacrifice for the truth?

Maria Ressa has spent decades speaking truth to power. But her work tracking disinformation networks seeded by her own government, spreading lies to its own citizens laced with anger and hate, has landed her in trouble with the most powerful man in the country - President Duterte.

Now, hounded by the state, she has multiple arrest warrants against her name, and a potential 100+ years behind bars to prepare for - while she stands trial for speaking the truth.

How to Stand Up to a Dictator is the story of how democracy dies by a thousand cuts, and how an invisible atom bomb has exploded online that is killing our freedoms. It maps a network of disinformation - a heinous web of cause and effect - that has netted the globe: from Duterte's drug wars, to America's Capitol Hill, to Britain's Brexit, to Russian and Chinese cyber-warfare, to Facebook and Silicon Valley, to our own clicks and our own votes.

Told from the frontline of the digital war, this is Maria Ressa's urgent cry for us to wake up and hold the line, before it is too late.

Praise for Maria Ressa:

Winner of the UNESCO Press Freedom Award 2021

'A personal hero of mine ... she's an important warning for the rest of us'
Hillary Clinton

'Maria Ressa is 5ft 2in, but she stands taller than most in her pursuit of the truth'
Amal Clooney

'Maria is a key voice ... she is so incredible in so many ways'
Carole Cadwalladr

Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9780753559208

Publisher: Ebury Publishing

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 17 November 2022

Country: United Kingdom

Imprint: W H Allen

Audience: General / adult, Tertiary education, Professional and scholarly

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 26.0mm

Width: 154.0mm

Height: 235.0mm

Weight: 388g

Pages: 320

About the Author

Maria Ressa is CEO, co-founder and President of Rappler, the Philippines's top digital news site. She is the current Nobel Laureate and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize 2021, the first Filipino in history to do so. She grew up in America and studied at Princeton University before working as a journalist in Asia for over 36 years. Maria has endured multiple arrests by the Duterte government, which is the subject of the 2020 Sundance Film Festival documentary, A THOUSAND CUTS. Ressa won the UNESCO World Press Freedom Prize 2021 and was TIME Person of the Year in 2018, and was named by TIME as one of the most inspiring and influential women of the century. She has also featured in Prospect's Top 50 Thinkers, Bloomberg 50, and the BBC's Top 100 Women. She has received countless awards for her work, including the Golden Pen of Freedom Award from the World Association of News Publishers. Before founding Rappler, Maria investigated terrorism in Southeast Asia, opening and running CNN's Manila Bureau and Jakarta Bureaus, before heading the largest news group in the Philippines. She wrote Seeds of Terror in 2003 and From Bin Laden to Facebook in 2012.

Also by Maria Ressa

View all
  • How to Stand Up to a Dictator
    How to Stand Up to a Dictator by Maria Ressa is a gripping account of one woman’s indomitable pursuit of truth in the face of overwhelming adversity. This powerful narrative is both a personal memoir and a broader manifesto against the encroaching threats to democracy and freedom posed by modern authoritarianism and disinformation. As Ressa, a seasoned journalist and the...
    Paperback
    $3000
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • How to Stand Up to a Dictator
    "In this impassioned warning and inspirational call to arms, Ressa identifies and illuminates her core values of empathy, honesty, and faith in humanity to illustrate how a strong commitment to such foundational beliefs can provide the key to democracy's survival. . . . Searing and electrifying." Booklist (starred review) From the recipient of the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize comes a...
    Paperback
    $5300
    Available
    Ships in 2-3 weeks
  • Pre-order
    The Fight Back
    Nobel Prize winner, New York Times bestselling author Maria Ressa provides readers with a powerful, practical, and positive guide to resisting authoritarianism and fighting to save democracy, for fans of Timothy Snyder's On Tyranny (over 20k TCM). Take Action to Save Democracy! The Fight Back is 40,000 words of actionable guidance for citizens everywhere who refuse to let democracy collapse....
    Paperback
    $4000
    Pre-order
    Out 13 Oct 2026

More from Politics & Current Affairs

View all
  • New Release
    One Last Question, Prime Minister
    From Muldoon to Luxon, untold stories from the House of Parliament Barry Soper has spent close to five decades questioning New Zealand's prime ministers.From the imposing, larger-than-life characters of Rob Muldoon and David Lange, to the golden age of Helen Clark and John Key, and the post-Covid era of Jacinda Ardern and the 'Chrises', Soper's insight and nose for a...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3999
    (6)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    Regime Change
    From the two reporters who have covered him more closely than perhaps anyone else over the past decade comes this definitive portrait of Donald Trump in the White House and the first year of his second presidency. Based on hundreds of interviews and unprecedented reporting from deep within the administration’s most closely guarded rooms, Regime Change takes the reader into...
    Paperback
    $3299
    Elsewhere:
    $4299
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    A Different Kind of Power
    #1 New Zealand bestseller #1 Amazon bestseller #2 Audible bestseller #3 New York Times bestseller #3 Sunday Times bestseller #4 Australian bestseller From the former prime minister of New Zealand, then the world’s youngest female head of government and just the second to give birth in office, comes a deeply personal memoir chronicling her extraordinary rise and offering inspiration to...
    Paperback
    $3200
    Elsewhere:
    $4000
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • A Different Kind of Power
    Ockham Winner
    A Different Kind of Power
    What if we could redefine leadership? What if kindness came first? Jacinda Ardern grew up the daughter of a police officer in small-town New Zealand, but as the 40th Prime Minister of her country, she commanded global respect for her empathetic leadership that put people first. This is the remarkable story of how a Mormon girl plagued by self-doubt made...
    Hardback
    $4799
    Elsewhere:
    $5999
    (7)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Signed Copy
    Go Hard or Go Home
    From the front bench to rock bottom:Β Go Hard or Go HomeΒ is Kiri Allan's fearless memoir of ambition, disruption and survival in NZ politics and beyond. Kiri Allan's six-year political career spanned some of the most challenging times in recent history. Events a government might encounter once in a generation stacked up: a terrorist attack, a volcanic eruption, destructive and deadly...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $4000
    Pre-order
    Out 4 Aug 2026
  • New Release
    Suicidal Empathy
    The bestselling author of The Parasitic Mind shows why empathy in politics leads to civilizational collapse. What happens when a society elevates victimhood to a virtue and decides that punishment is cruel? You get the disease Dr. Gad Saad calls suicidal empathy. And the West may be terminally infected. In his new book, Suicidal Empathy, Saad unleashes a blistering critique...
    Paperback
    $3099
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    The Day After: How to Wield Power in a Post-Trump World
    From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Shameless, Brian Tyler Cohen explores how Republicans have abused power, how Democrats have refused to exercise power when they held it, and how progressives should wield power if they are fortunate enough to win a free and fair election in a post-Trump world. The Day After: How to Wield Power in...
    Paperback
    $3099
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Careless People
    Shocking and darkly funny, Careless People gives you a front-row seat to the decisions that are shaping our world and the people who make them. Welcome to Facebook. Sarah Wynn-Williams, a young diplomat from New Zealand, pitched for her dream job. She saw Facebook's potential and knew it could change the world for the better. But, when she got there...
    Paperback
    $2800
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Discipline
    Silence is complicity, but how do we confront the cost of speaking up? Sydney, May 2021. Ashraf is an academic whose career and personal life are in freefall. Hannah is a young journalist struggling to honour the voices of her community. When a Year 12 Al-Bayinnah College student is arrested for protesting a university's ties to an Israeli weapons manufacturer,...
    Paperback
    $4000
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Shattered Lands
    'A sparkling debut by an outstanding young historian' – PETER FRANKOPAN 'This book is a revelation … both original and important' – MISHAL HUSAIN A history of modern South Asia told through five partitions that reshaped it. As recently as 1928, a vast swathe of Asia – India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Burma, Nepal, Bhutan, Yemen, Oman, the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, and...
    Paperback
    $3699
    Elsewhere:
    $4500
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • The Handmaid's Tale
    The bestselling dystopian classic that became a cultural phenomenon and inspired an award-winning TV series. THE SUNDAY TIMES NO. 1 BESTSELLER Go back to where it all began with the dystopian novel behind the award-winning TV series. 'As relevant today as it was when Atwood wrote it.' Guardian I believe in the resistance as I believe there can be no...
    Paperback
    $2000
    Elsewhere:
    $2400
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This
    'A howl from the heart of our age' β€” Richard Flanagan 'A unique and urgently needed book.' β€” Naomi Klein 'A powerful, uncomfortable but thought-provoking read.' β€” Dua Lipa 'Clear, elegant and devastatingly truthful... Read this shatteringly honest book.' β€” Max Porter From award-winning novelist and journalist Omar El Akkad, an urgent and necessary reckoning with what it means to...
    Paperback
    $3100
    Elsewhere:
    $3800
    In Stock
    Ships today

Why buy from us?

Book Hero is not a chain store or big box retailer. We're an independent 100% NZ-owned business on a mission to help more Kiwis rediscover a love of books and reading!

Service & Delivery

Service & Delivery

Our warehouse in Auckland holds over 100,000 books, toys, board games and puzzles in-stock so you're not waiting for your order to arrive from overseas.

Auckland Bookstore

Auckland Bookstore

We're primarily an online store, but for your convenience you can pick up your order for free from our bookstore, which is right next door to our warehouse in Hobsonville.

Our Gifting Service

Our Gifting Service

Books make wonderful thoughtful gifts and we're here to help with gift-wrapping and cards. We can even send your gift directly to your loved one.