Is democracy still alive? Will it guarantee the “normal world order” that everyone was waiting for just recently? The monograph is devoted to the modern decline of Europe's political style and the crisis of democratic culture. Krastev sees the problem not in the institutions of democracy, but in the loss of trust of the masses in the elites. He describes a world of mistrust management, where elites have fenced themselves off from voters through “transparency” and “monitory democracy.” Ukraine's drama - elite corruption and street protests - is leading the middle class into a populist trap. Having become an online conspiracy theorist, the voter fell into the hands of mistrust managers. The author of the book is European political scientist and philosopher Ivan Krastev, chairman of the Center for Liberal Strategies (Sofia) and permanent researcher at the Institute of Humanities (IWM, Vienna). One of the world's leading intellectuals offers a succinct outline of the changes coming to Russia: the boom of conspiracy theories in the twilight of democracy.