The first step in liquidating a people is to erase its memory. Destroy its books, its culture, its history. Then have somebody write new books, manufacture a new culture, invent a new history. Before long the nation will begin to forget what it is and what it was. The world around it will forget even faster.
The most significant threat to liberal democracy today is not from rival ideologies like communism or fascism, but from within—from the rise of populism and the erosion of democratic norms.