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  • Published: 24 September 2024
  • ISBN: 9781529922868
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 464
  • RRP: $26.99
Categories:

Politics On the Edge




A searing insider's account of ten extraordinary years in Parliament from former Cabinet minister Rory Stewart

Over the course of a decade from 2010, Rory Stewart went from being a political outsider to standing for prime minister – before being sacked from a Conservative Party that he had come to barely recognise.

Tackling ministerial briefs on flood response and prison violence, engaging with conflict and poverty abroad as a foreign minister, and Brexit as a Cabinet minister, Stewart learned first-hand how profoundly hollow and inadequate our democracy and government had become. Cronyism, ignorance and sheer incompetence ran rampant. Around him, individual politicians laid the foundations for the political and economic chaos of today. Stewart emerged battered but with a profound affection for his constituency of Penrith and the Border, and a deep direct insight into the era of populism and global conflict.

Politics On the Edge invites us into the mind of one of the most interesting actors on the British political stage. Uncompromising, candid and darkly humorous, this is his story of the challenges, absurdities and realities of political life. Instantly praised as a new classic, it is an astonishing portrait of our turbulent times.

  • Published: 24 September 2024
  • ISBN: 9781529922868
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 464
  • RRP: $26.99
Categories:

About the author

Rory Stewart

Rory Stewart OBE was born in Hong Kong in 1973. He is the author of four books, including bestsellers The Places in Between, which describes the last section of his 6,000 mile walk across Afghanistan, and The Marches, about a walk with his father in the borderlands between Scotland and England. His books have sold over half a million copies, been translated into multiple languages, and been awarded several prizes including the Ondaatje Prize of the Royal Society of Literature.

From 2010-2019 he was the Member of Parliament for Penrith and The Border. During his career as a politician he served in several ministerial roles, including as Secretary of State for International Development in 2019. He has been awarded the Order of the British Empire (for his work in Iraq), the Gold Medal of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society (for his work in Afghanistan), a Scottish BAFTA (for the documentaries he has made and presented with the BBC) and honorary doctorates from Stirling University and the American University of Paris. He tweets at @RoryStewartUK.

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