Authoritarian Advance

 

Authoritarian Advance

The world is dividing into two fundamentally different governing philosophies. Broadly speaking one hand are the authoritarian mainly Russia, China plus places like Cuba, Venezuela, N Korea,Iran. On the other are the liberal democracies, most of Western Europe, UK, US plus such as Japan, S Korea.

Authoritarian countries espouse the idea of a strong leader who brooks no opposition and citizens are expectedly to do as they are told. Their citizens are subject to surveillance and their behaviours proscribed. Government propaganda replaces objective information. Authoritarian countries often pay lip service to democracy without any real attempt to obey its norms; indeed subvert it to achieve the leaders aims. Most worrying of all authoritarian countries tend to be aggressive, unhesitating to bully, threaten and even attack others who disagree. They have contempt for the rule of law in any meaningful way seeing it as another way to exert control.

In contrast liberal democracies have a free press and economy, apply democracy and have a functioning and objective legal system. In general liberal democracies have also more religious and social freedoms.

The aggression of authoritarian systems is being tragically shown in the Russian attack on Ukraine. In a steady manner Ukraine was moving from the previous Soviet control towards becoming a typical Western nation. This was an imperfect change but transitioning from the Soviet style to a Western one was always going to be slow.

There has been reporting of Russian objectives which we can dismiss as a fairy story only for the extremely gullible. There has also been a speculation about the real motives. Putin was brought up in the Soviet era. He became, as a KGB agent, into an important and prestigious role. He seeks to go back to that era.

The prime authoritarian government is in China. The secretive rulers loudly proclaim communism and maintain the most rigid control. Their aggression is shown by their imposition of tight control in Hong Kong despite solemn agreements not to do so. They maintain that Taiwan belongs to them and unhesitatingly bully all who attempt to maintain diplomatic contacts. The state control over media is absolute including internet control through a massive firewall insulating Chinese people from the cacophony of full internet use. Any information which the leadership doesn’t like is blocked.

Outside the two major counties Russia and China there are others who are authoritarian. Most often this is in an effort to maintain existing rulers. The playbook is drearily familiar; wangle power then manipulate to maintain that power whether by election rigging or by avoiding elections completely. Motivations are sometimes ideological but just as often it is a wish to enjoy wealth and power by corrupting state institutions.

One of the tragedies of democracy is that electorates can be persuaded to vote leaders into power not realising they will never have any opportunity to vote them out. Once in power the state can be manipulated. Key is to keep the armed forces or police sweet and use them to keep the population in line. Popular uprisings can occur but it takes great courage and any leader willing to be ruthless can withstand popular pressure. An example was Belarus where Lukashenko put down an uprising successfully.

In countries without any of the attributes of a modern society this is surprisingly easy. Even a country with a strong tradition of freedom such as the US can show an authoritarian streak as in denying freedom to abortion. Despite a clear majority in favour of full freedom it is possible for dedicated campaigners to use state controls to impose their views.

Religious or pseudo religious intolerance is still found in countries like Iran or Afghanistan. Purportedly Islamic rules appear more to reflect a strong cultural bias. It is a great tragedy that Afghanistan has been allowed to step back to a point where women are subject to such a misogynistic life.

Nothing lays a country open to abuse as shear incompetence of its rulers. Sri Lanka is a recent example where a “strong man” proved utterly incompetent. Sadly all to often those leaders who see themselves in strong man role find favour with authoritarian regimes. They may aspire to be a Putin themselves. Even countries with at least some semblance of a liberal society may find themselves with leaders of this type such as Bolsanario in Brazil and AMLO in Mexico.