The True Believer Summary

The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements, is a sociology book written by Eric Hoffer in 1951. His book attempts to explain and analyze the motives of mass movements, how and why mass movements start, how they advance and the way they will end, and the similarities between all of them. Whether it is, social movements, religious movements, political movements, personality’s movements, and so on. He argues in his book that, the goals of every mass movement are substitutable because all mass movements attract the same followers, use similar tactics, and share certain essential characteristics to get their members. Some of the examples he uses were, the fanatical Christian, the fanatical Mohammad, the fanatical nationalist, the fanatical Communist, and the fanatical Nazi. In
Some of the reason Hoffer give that people become part of a mass movement is because of the desire for change, the desire for substitutes, and the interchangeability of mass movement. As people became part of a mass movement, their desire is to begin a new life, “it is a truism that many who join a rising revolution movement are attracted by the