Archive for the ‘Democracy’ Category

On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder review how to defend democracy in the age of Trump – The Guardian

Winston Churchill once famously declared: Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time. Underpinned by the rule of law and the popular will, democracy is the only way we can prevent the arbitrary exercise of tyrannical power: suppression of free speech; curtailment or abolition of civil liberties; laws passed by decree without public debate or popular approval; arrest and imprisonment without trial; torture and murder by unchecked agencies of the government; and theft, extortion and embezzlement by politicians in power, who inevitably turn into kleptocrats when democracy is destroyed.

Yet democracy is a fragile creation. After a period following the collapse of the Soviet Union, when constitutional democracy spread to many countries not just in Europe but across the globe, and Francis Fukuyama declared that history had come to an end, the tide seems to have turned. Democracies are now being destroyed in Russia, Hungary, Turkey and Poland, as strongmen such as Putin, Orban, Erdoan and Kaczyski dismantle civil liberties, silence critical voices and suppress independent institutions. What makes itworse is that such would-be dictators enjoy popular support for what they are doing. A similar process may well be under way with the advent of the Trump regime in the United States.

How we defend ourselves against the suppression of fundamental freedoms has once again become a matter of great urgency

How we defend our most fundamental freedoms has once again become a matter of great urgency. The historian Timothy Snyder has produced this short book as one response. History, and especially the history of the 20th century, has lessons for us all, he contends. Aspecialist on east-central Europe, Snyder made his name with abook, Bloodlands, that argued, less than persuasively, for an equivalence of Stalins purges with the Nazi Holocaust. More recently, he has declared in Black Earth that the Holocaust was not about the implementation of paranoid antisemitism but an attempt to gain controlof more agricultural land as an alternative to using science to improve the natural environment. His argument did not find many supporters. What does he say in his latest tract?

On Tyranny is less an anatomy of tyranny itself than an essay about how we might stop it from happening. Do not obey in advance, he says. Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. After Hitler came to power, many if not most Germans voluntarily offered their obedience to his regime. We should heed this warning and refuse to do so ourselves. And certainly, the millions of state servants who ran Germany did indeed rush to join the Nazi party to save their jobs. Later on, few opposed the growing antisemitism of the regime or its genocidal outcome. But Snyder forgets the degree of coercion to which they were subjected. It was no easy thing to risk your job when over a third of the workforce was unemployed, as it was in 1933. Hundreds of thousands of Nazistormtroopers were roaming the streets beating up and killing the Social Democrats and Communists who were the regimes main opponents. Up to 200,000 people, overwhelmingly thoseon the political left, were throwninto concentration camps and brutallymistreated. The great mass ofGermans did not obey in advance: they obeyed when tyranny had already set up its tent.

In Germany in 1933, most oppositional parties were suppressed by force or the threat of force

In Czechoslovakia in 1946, to take another example offered by Snyder, free elections resulted in 38% of the vote going to the Communists (by an interesting coincidence, roughly the same as the popular vote for the Nazis in 1932); within the next three years, democratic institutions were annihilated as people followed their drive to monopolise power. Here too, however, the driving force was the occupying Red Army, and even in other east-central European states such as Romania, Poland or East Germany, where support for communism was far weaker, the same thing happened: Stalinism came to power at the end of a Red Army bayonet. Its not always easy to refuse to obey in such circumstances, and what we really need is to work out how to resist the imposition of a dictatorship when its not backed by massive violence against its opponents but claims to be establishing itself with popular consent and the validation of the law.

Snyders second lesson is to defend institutions, by which he means the courts, the constitution, the press, the trade unions, the parliament and so on. The example he gives, however, illustrates a different point: he shows German Jews underestimating the Nazis and assuming Hitler would be controlled by his conservative coalition partners, calm down and become more moderate once he got into power. We do not need the example of Nazi Germany to demonstrate the fallacy of these beliefs: Trump has already shown how mistaken they are in the first few weeks of his presidency. It is not at all clear, though, that people actually have underestimated Trump. He clearly is impulsive, ignorant about foreign policy and inconsistent in many of his statements unlike Hitler, who arrived with clear purposes at home and abroad, and prepared everything he said carefully beforehand. The mistake some have made is to assume that Trump would be curbed by more moderate advisers. Even if he does submit to control, his choice of advisers has steered clear of moderation.

Snyders third lesson is beware the one-party state. As he rightly remarks, this is in a way unnecessary, because most people will realise that the suppression of oppositional political parties is a glaringly obvious step on the way to dictatorship. Here again, however, it is important not to ignore the element of coercion in this process. In Germany in 1933, most oppositional parties were suppressed by force or the threat of force; even the large Catholic Centre party was threatened with violence as well as bribed with false promises of Nazi respect for the institutions it held dear. And sometimes the preservation of a multi-party system can mask the creation of a dictatorship: Communist-run East Germany, for example, had a multiplicity of political parties right up to the end, including its own version ofthe Christian Democrats. But these parties were all kept rigidly in line, used by the regime as transmission belts for the communication of its ideology to areas of society active Christians, former Nazis and so on who might otherwise be impervious to it.

Snyders fourth lesson is take responsibility for the face of the world in other words, be sceptical about propaganda. This lesson is essentially the same as various others he suggests: be kind to our language, believe in truth, investigate, listen for dangerous words. And indeed when Trump brands any criticism as fake news and proclaims blatant untruths as facts, we have entered the era of post-truth and alternative facts. No wonder sales of George Orwells Nineteen Eighty-Four have surged in the US. We certainly need to be persistent and unyielding in nailing politicians lies, though it is doubtful whether Snyders recommendation, which involves reading that old authoritarian Fyodor Dostoevskys double-decker novel The Brothers Karamazov, will be of much use.

Snyder also tells us, somewhat unnecessarily, that we can survive tyranny by establishing a private life and staying calm when the unthinkable arrives. The creeping destruction of democracy can be stopped or reversed; its not inevitable, as his injunction to be as courageous as you can implies. In this book, as in his others, Snyder provokes us to think again about major issues of our time, as well as significant elements of the past, but he seems to have rushed it out rather too quickly. Itcould do with far greater depth of historical illustration, not to mention recourse to the many thinkers whose wisdom we might profit from in dealing with the issue of tyranny and how to combat it. Democracy dies in many different ways, and to help us in defending our rights we need a more thoughtful book than this.

Richard J Evans The Pursuit of Power: Europe 1815-1914 is published by Penguin. On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century is published by Publisher. To order a copy for 7.64 (RRP 8.99) go to bookshop.theguardian.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over 10, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of 1.99.

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On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder review how to defend democracy in the age of Trump - The Guardian

Donald Trump’s Definition of Democracy Is Dangerous – Fortune

President Donald J. Trump enters the Oval Office on March 5, 2017 in Washington, DC.Erik S. Lesser-Pool/Getty Images

President Donald Trump and his advisors are all about the American people. But their continual invocation of these people reveals how the language of democracyparticularly when accompanied by colorful pictures of cheering crowdscan become a powerful tool in the consolidation of profoundly undemocratic political processes and ideas.

When, for instance, Trump calls the press the enemy of the people, he is possibly not even aware of the history behind the phrase as a rallying cry for the Soviet Unions Stalin-era witch hunts for hidden traitors. Such attacks are not intended only for journalists critical of him, but broadly apply to the entire edifice of public servantscareer diplomats, policy experts, analysts, and pressthat the White House portrays as a drag on U.S. democracy. This appears to be one small piece of a larger administration effort to develop a division in the U.S. public imagination, with the public servant class on one hand, and Trumpthe chosen emissary of Americas no-longer-silent majorityon the other.

Since the election of Jimmy Carter, almost every president, Democrat and Republican alike, has come to power by positioning himself as an outsider, assailing politics as usual and threatening to shake up the Washington establishment. But Trump chief strategist Stephen Bannons promises to launch a deconstruction of the U.S. administrative state go beyond such standard critiques of the status quo. Instead, the Bannon camp is suggesting that a host of agencies and organizations long considered central to good governance are full of inefficient and unreliable schemers, catering to their own interests rather than to the peoples real needs.

Trump presents himself as the oppositean instrument of direct democracy with an unfiltered connection to the ordinary American and a determination to defy all cowardly intermediaries who might wish to hamstring the bold words and actions that he claims reflect the peoples will. ( You think it, I say it , was a standard campaign phrase.) In truth, Trump favors stadium rallies over face-to-face meetings with small groups of constituents. During the New Hampshire primaries, he marveled at how slow the process of actual connection could be. People would go and have dinner with the voters like, five people, a family and theyd sit there and have dinner for two and a half hours If I did that people would lose respect for me. Instead, he prolifically tweets to his over 26 million followers, manufacturing a sense of uncensored immediacy.

We should care about this rhetorical strategy because Trump advisors are starting to redefine the very meaning of democracy, in much the same way they have already succeeded in transforming the meaning of fake news. The figure of the president, keeping his promises to the American people, is being upheld as fundamentally rival to a system of checks and balances designed to contain the executive branch and another system of expertise intended to advise it.

In continually allying himself with the people in opposition to institutional power, Trump is doing several things. First, he is undermining the role of deep knowledge in government decision-making and removing opportunities for experts to air their views, particularly when those views might diverge from a predetermined political line. Scientists at the Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Health and Human Services, and other government-funded agencies have been forbidden to publish or speak publicly about their work without White House approval. The State Department, which employs nearly 70,000 people worldwide, is facing a 37% budget cut , and the administration has given short shrift to much of the analysis the department puts out. Meanwhile, Trump is the first president since World War II to eschew a daily security briefing. The reports, he has stated publicly, are repetitive, and since he is a smart person, he doesnt have to be told the same thing in the same words every single day for the next eight years .

At the same time, the president is encouraging the splintering of authority in the civic sphere, among those voices outside government that cannot be so easily controlled. He is doing so by proclaiming a large segment of the mainstream media to be not simply biased but deliberately fake and aimed at discrediting the true American polity. Those journalists, Trump warned a crowd in Melbourne, Fla., have an agenda, and their agenda is not your agenda.

But Trump and his advisors are also praising the increasing fragmentation of Americas information landscape as yet another laudable manifestation of direct democracy. Applauding the fact that people get their news now from literally hundreds and thousands of sites, the president of the American Conservative Union termed this historical moment a time of great democratization in journalism.

Encouraging the proliferation of a multiplicity of media voices may not seem like an authoritarian strategy. It certainly diverges sharply from the media policy of a more textbook type of top-down regime like Russias. There, the three major television channels are unified around positive coverage of President Vladimir Putin, and a background apparatus of censorship is in place to portray him not only as a man of the people, but also as an uncontested leader above the fray and backed by a hegemonic state apparatus.

Trumps people, in contrast, encourage chatterthe emergence of a relativized world where every opinion can be of equal value. As described in a recent Foreign Affairs article, How America Lost Faith in Expertise, the current social climate is one where any guy on the street is entitled to know as much about any issue as, say, a Nobel Prize winner. These days, author Tom Nichols writes, members of the public search for expert errors and revel in finding themnot to improve understanding but rather to give themselves license to disregard all expert advice they dont like .

In such a corrupted environment, where even the most straightforward of facts can find a challenger, Trump can shine as the loudest, brashest voice of self-proclaimed authority. Its not about truth, as much as power. As he himself puts it: The era of empty talk is over, its over. Now is the time for action.

Cynthia Hooper is an associate professor of history and director of Russian and Eastern European studies at the College of the Holy Cross .

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Donald Trump's Definition of Democracy Is Dangerous - Fortune

The Victim Of Populism Is Democracy – Huffington Post

PARISJean dOrmesson was born in Paris in 1925. A writer and philosopher, he received the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor in 2014. I spoke to him recently in Paris about the upcoming elections in France and the rise of populism globally.

Do you see a real possibility that Marine Le Pen and the National Front can win the French elections?

The National Front is clearly making steady progress. I remember when the party of the extreme right in France at the time of [Jean-Louis] Tixier-Vignancour reached a maximum of 2 percent of the vote. Later Jean-Marie Le Pens party gained a maximum of 3 to 4 percent of the vote. But now there is a populist wave all across the world I am thinking for example of Brexit, of Trump, of the Dutch elections and today Le Pen is at 26-27 percent.

For several months Le Pen has been the only candidate to be certain of going into the second round; the others, I am not sure. As I said before Le Pen will have approximately 25-30 percent of the votes but I do not think that she can be elected. She will face the Socialist Party led by [Benot] Hamon and the extreme left led by [Jean-Luc] Mlenchon. If they were united they would represent 25 percent, more or less the same percentage as Le Pen.

Anyway, I think that in the end Le Pen will be defeated. In my opinion, [Francois] Fillon if he is still in the race despite the scandal that has engulfed him or Macron will win the elections in the end. I do believe that Le Pen will be elected in the elections of 2022, but even now all possibilities are open. If, unfortunately, there should be a horrible attack two days before the elections, it would be a catastrophe, and in that case Le Pen could win.

Lukas Schulze via Getty Images

Are the French anxious and worried?

France has changed. For many years it was a country organized into two parties: the conservatives and the socialists, the right and the left. Macron has said correctly that bipartisanship is finished and it has been replaced by quadri-partisanship: Le Pen at the extreme right and the extreme left of Mlenchon, and then the traditional left and the traditional right. But it is not only politics that have changed but also the French people, who were once happy and carefree. As Cocteau rightly said they have become like Italians in a bad mood. The democratic system has been threatened and people are tending towards extremes. The victory of the National Front would be an economic catastrophe the return to the Franc, the closing of borders in short a great chaos.

Brexit and the election of Trump seemed to be unforeseeable events. They are, however, things that have happened.

You cannot absolutely trust the polls today, and also for many years people did not dare to admit that they voted for the National Front. Today, this trend has changed, and people are less afraid to say that they vote for the National Front. This could increase the partys vote to 30 percent.

What kind of a country is France today?

Its a country in bad shape. The five years of the Hollande presidency have been disastrous. He has not kept his promises and he was not able to reduce unemployment and increase the standard of living. Today France may seem to be turning the page, but the danger of terrorism and the problem of migrants is strong. Security is one of the main priorities, and with Le Pen there will be no more migrants because the borders will be closed. A large number of Christians vote for the National Front and I do not understand how they can support a political party that wants to close doors. I have to say that Hollande was better on the topic of security than he was on the economic front.

Do you worry about the world of culture, how are things for French culture?

The French language is doing very badly; it is hard to fight against English. It is also true that books and newspapers are in difficulty. Some publishers are doing well, but there is a negative trend and bookstore sales have been reduced by between 5 to 15 percent. Current events have certainly invigorated peoples desire to read newspapers, and for the moment the freedom of the press is total in France.

And if the National Front wins?

It will not only be a disaster for the poor and for the rich, but it will also affect culture, and the freedom of the press will be threatened.

Do intellectuals still have a voice in France today?

I am not an intellectual, I consider myself a humble writer. The left wing intellectuals went further right than myself. All of France is moving to the right. The Communist Party and the Socialists no longer seem to exist in France. However, writers still have a privileged situation. A writer in France still has a voice in society, although the myth of the great writer, such as Victor Hugo or Franois Mauriac or Andr Gide, no longer exists. The people have violently rejected the political class, all politicians are unpopular and the press is not seen in a very good light. Writers do still enjoy a certain respect.

You are a French academician. What is the role of the Academy of France today?

It does not have very much to do with literature, it is more like a meeting place for interesting people. Neither [Jean-Paul] Sartre nor [Andr] Malraux nor [Albert] Camus were French academicians, but the Academy of France definitely has an undeniable prestige, especially abroad, because it represents a certain French esprit. The French esprit prevailing at the time of Voltaire and Descartes.

One thing remains at the Academy that has otherwise disappeared in France I am talking about conversation. Formerly there were literary salons, but they disappeared. In the last 60-70 years, they were replaced by literary cafes, but now even those have disappeared and conversation has gone with them.

Does France still have a leading cultural role in Europe today?

France follows the destiny of Europe. For centuries the dominance of Europe was total, but I would like to say that culture goes hand in hand with a flourishing economy and military power. Both Louis XIV and Napoleon understood this very well. Tomorrow, the most important philosophers will be Indian, Chinese and Brazilian. The advance of populism is due to the weakness of Europe.

What about the United States?

Who would ever have expected four months ago an America with [Donald] Trump as president? And that is the opposite of what the world thinks about America. In both America and Europe today, there is great hostility toward the system. The real victim of all this is democracy.

What kind of a world do we live in nowadays?

It is a difficult period. The world has always changed, but today it is changing with a faster pace. I am not among those who say that it was better before. In spite of the great success of science it is unequivocally important to save a clear concept of humankind, and to reconcile the triumph of science with humanism.

Do you think that there will be new wars?

There should be no more wars, because we have created Europe, but if populism triumphs, things will change. We absolutely must safeguard the idea of Europe. Europe has succeeded in two things: the single currency and the absence of war. Wars will certainly continue in Africa, in Asia, but we must ensure absolute vigilance against populism. Young people have a tendency to be extremist, but we must prevent them from voting for the National Front.

In conclusion, what is your opinion about your country?

It is definitely somewhat anxious and unhappy. The French language, as I said at the beginning, is becoming less important, and France is not the first country in a Europe that is no longer the center of the world. It is wrong, though, to be talking about decline all the time. What I believe is that Africa will have an increasingly important role. The future is Africa.

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The Victim Of Populism Is Democracy - Huffington Post

The Liberal Democrats should learn to respect democracy, even if they don’t like the Brexit result – Telegraph.co.uk

Is there any party less aptly named than the Liberal Democrats? A truly liberal party would embrace the chance to shape Britains future as a self-governing nation outside the EU, free to trade with the world. And a democratic one would respect what the people voted for in one of the biggest exercises of democracy in modern times. Instead, the Lib Dems want to stop Brexit.

With only nine MPs, the Lib Dems can do little harm in the House of Commons, but there are over 100 of them in the House of Lords, many rashly given peerages by David Cameron to placate his Coalition allies. Those peers are seeking to force the Government to hold a second referendum on the final Brexit deal; they say they will vote against the Bill that will authorise Theresa May to trigger Article 50 unless their scheme for another public vote is written into law.

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The Liberal Democrats should learn to respect democracy, even if they don't like the Brexit result - Telegraph.co.uk

How Important Are Nonviolent Protests and Media Criticism in Preserving Democracy? Depends Which Party You … – Reason (blog)

Pax Ahimsa Gethen / Wikimedia CommonsA recent Pew Research report looked into what characteristics Americans feel are essential for a strong democracy to flourish. The survey asked 1,503 American adults how important things such as fair and open national elections are in preserving democracy.

Of those surveyed, 89 percent believed that open and fair national elections were essential for a strong democracy, while 83 percent saw having a system of checks and balances as critical. Seventy-nine percent thought that people having the right to nonviolently protest was important, and 74 percent favored protecting the rights of people who hold unpopular views. Only 64 percent thought that news organizations being free to criticize political leaders was essential.

Breaking the data down along party lines shows little difference between Republicans and Democratsexcept on a two key points.

Sixty-eight percent of Republicans viewed nonviolent protests as important, compared to 88 percent of Democrats.

Republicans' lower propensity to see this right as essential is reflected in a recent push to crack down on the practice. GOP lawmakers in at least 18 states have introduced some form of anti-protesting legislation, according to The Washington Post.

Inspired by the North Dakota pipeline protests, state Rep. Keith Kempenich introduced a bill that would make motorists not liable for unintentionally hitting protesters who are blocking a roadway. A bill sponsored by Iowa state Sen. Jake Chapman would make intentionally blocking traffic on a highway a felony punishable by up to five years in prison. Missouri Rep. Don Phillips introduced legislation to penalize anyone wearing a mask or disguise during an unlawful protest.

Civil liberties groups like the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) have called the anti-protesting legislation unconstitutional and an "unlawful infringements on our right to speak." As the ACLU notes, some of the bills have stalled (including the one in North Dakota) or been dropped altogether (including ones in Michigan and Virginia).

A 20-percentage-point difference is nothing to sneeze at, but it pales in comparison to the current partisan divide over the importance of the right of the press to criticize political officials. While 76 percent of Democrats believed a free press was essential, only 49 percent of Republicans felt the same way.

Trust in the media has been declining, as noted by Gallup, so it's no wonder both Democrats and Republicans feel journalists' role in preserving democracy is less vital than the role of things like checks and balances. But you still have to wonder at the extent to which President Trump's ongoing feud with the media and the anti-Trump protests of recent months seem to be shaping the views of GOP supporters. It's also hard not to think the results might be flipped if Democrats were still in power.

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How Important Are Nonviolent Protests and Media Criticism in Preserving Democracy? Depends Which Party You ... - Reason (blog)