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The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State
Jill Lepore
  • Published: 6 August 2026
  • ISBN: 9781837314744
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 336

The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State

Formats & editions
Hardback
10 Nov 2026
EBook
6 Aug 2026
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By a writer hailed as 'America’s greatest living essayist' (Fintan O’Toole) an urgent account of how rule by machine has ravaged the world

It presented itself as a form of futurism. But the future envisioned by the architects of the Artificial State looked, chillingly, like the very worst of the past…

We live in the age of data. Over the past century, rapidly evolving technologies have transformed every aspect of our society, in troubling and seemingly unstoppable ways. Political campaigns have been reduced to attention-mining algorithms, multinational corporations control public discourse, and the era of the liberal nation-state seems to be coming to an end, replaced by the rule of artificial intelligence. Today, power is maintained through mystification: machines, we are told, know what humans cannot. Yet nothing about any of this was, or is, inevitable.

In this astounding account of how technology has corroded democracy around the world, prizewinning historian Jill Lepore traces the rise and fall of what she calls the ‘Artificial State’. Examining everything from robot rights and Elon Musk’s origins to what data centres cost wildlife, Lepore offers a history – and a perspective – wholly missing from the debate.

History, Lepore demonstrates, is driven not by machines but by individuals, societies, cultures and ideas. The architects of the Artificial State had no theory of governance, nor did they have any interest in the rule of law, or any capacity for restraint. They drew their ideas not from science, but from science fiction. Yet everything destructive that they have done can be undone. By illuminating the origins of the Artificial State, Lepore reveals how we can escape it – helping us to imagine, and fight for, a different future.
  • Published: 6 August 2026
  • ISBN: 9781837314744
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 336
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About the author

Jill Lepore

JILL LEPORE is the David Woods Kemper ’41 Professor of American History at Harvard University and a staff writer at The New Yorker. Her books include the New York Times best seller The Secret History of Wonder Woman and Book of Ages, a finalist for the National Book Award. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
 

portrait photo of Jill Lepore

Also by Jill Lepore

The Secret History of Wonder Woman
A Is for American
The Name of War
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Praise for The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State

There are times when a historian is absolutely necessary for understanding the future--this is one of those times, and Jill Lepore is the perfect person for the job. A fascinating, perceptive and completely timely account of how we got to artificial intelligence and how we might get past it

Bill McKibben, author of Here Comes the Sun

A person can’t help but feel inspired by the riveting intelligence and joyful curiosity of Jill Lepore. Knowing that there is a mind like hers in the world is a hope-inducing thing.

George Saunders

Who’s going to determine the future: the tech billionaires or the rest of us? Jill Lepore argues that there’s nothing inevitable about eliminating jobs, destroying ecosystems, and arming authoritarian regimes. The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State is at once dazzling in its range and totally on target

Elizabeth Kolbert

Lepore is our best scholar of the culture of governance, and our most vital historian. Here she repudiates the prospect of AI as a replacement for democracy. This is the issue of our times, and Lepore is the voice of sanity

Jaron Lanier

Superb. The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State is the best account I’ve ever seen of how the owners and controllers of data technology have changed and are changing us in ways we are only just beginning to grasp. Lepore seems to have left nothing out, and the result is a history that is richly informed, a view of human progress that is wise and balanced, and a timely and terrifying warning

Philip Pullman

As both a Jeremiah and a troubadour, Jill Lepore has one of the most distinctive voices in American literary life

David W. Blight

Jill Lepore is unquestionably one of America’s best historians; it’s fair to say she’s one of its best writers too

Los Angeles Times

Jill Lepore writes history like a poet

Dan Snow

Lepore is a brilliant historian with an eye for unusual and revealing stories

James Gleick

Lepore is a sophisticated and original thinker and an ensnaring, witty, and provocative storyteller

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