by Stefano Vaccara NEW YORK (ITALPRESS) – In the essay “Trump and the American revolution. From where they come, where they take us” (Editoriale Scientifica, 2026), polytologist Ottorino Cappelli, professor of Comparative Policy at the University of Naples “L’Orientale” with a long research experience between Harvard and New York, proposes a clear reading key and, in many ways, disturbing about what is happening in the United States. The central point is this: focusing on the “pathological” traits of Donald Trump, from narcissism to verbal intemperance, can be reassuring but misleading. For Cappelli, trumpism is not the product of an individual psychology, but the most visible expression of a long-term political and institutional transformation. Trump, in this perspective, is the vehicle of a “revolution” that aims to weaken the counterweights of liberal democracy and to move the axis of power towards an increasingly stronger presidency. Cappelli reconstructs the genealogy of this breakthrough, focusing on the convergence between plebiscitarian populism, cultural war, conservative think tanks and juridical doctrines favoring “superpresidentialism”. The book also recalls Project 2025, the plan promoted by the Heritage Foundation, as a stamp of a design that aims to politicize the federal administration and to bring back the state machine under the direct control of the executive. One of the most alarming chapters is the electoral field: for the author, the real game is not only “who wins” at the next consultations, but in what conditions you vote. Administrative restrictions, redesign of the colleges, pressure on the public apparatus and securitarian climate can become instruments to limit, circumvent or empty democratic control. This is a positive review for rigor and clarity, but disturbing in the conclusions: Cappelli invites you to look beyond the Trump character and to measure, step by step, the scope of a project that risks redefining American democracy in an authoritarian sense. -photo book cover –(ITALPRESS).
