How to Save the Internet

Brought to you by Penguin.

The global, open internet is fragmenting. As democracies seek to rein in the power of Big Tech, as Silicon Valley pivots to an America-first agenda, and as authoritarian regimes segregate their populations from the rest of the internet, the most powerful tool ever created for bringing the world together risks being dismantled.

Taking us behind the scenes at Meta and his interactions with world leaders, Nick Clegg, Meta’s former President, Global Affairs, sets out where Big Tech has gone wrong, how Silicon Valley’s insularity has blinded it to its missteps, and sets out the radical reforms now needed if it is to retain society’s permission to exist.

But he also makes the case that many of the charges against it – including that its algorithms polarise, manipulate and harm – are vastly overstated or simply untrue. And while new laws that regulate the global platforms are essential, imposing national borders on them – as authoritarian states like China and Russia have already done and as Europe is beginning to do – will eventually unmake the single-most important means we have for knowledge-sharing, trade, scientific collaboration and the enhancement of billions of lives.

Radical, reasonable, deeply felt and disarmingly honest, How To Save the Internet sets out a blueprint for a new era of global cooperation in order to reform Big Tech while preserving the fundamental openness of the internet – and thus the greatest opportunity for development and democratic empowerment of our lifetimes.

© Nick Clegg 2025 (P) Penguin Audio 2025