A few thoughts on Democracy

At the end of Pierre Hassner's article on Russia's transition, he invokes an interesting quote that summed up one of the major themes of this week's readings on Post-communist states and democracy: "Liberal democracy is the least natural regime on earth".

For the most part, as Americans raised in a highly normative mold as to the best or most legitimate form of Government, we tend to think of political systems as existing roughly on a scale of better to worse -- and often in a sort of teleological flux. It is easy to cultivate such an attitude: a mix of patriotism (with a natural inclination towards liberal democracy), historical precedent (the scores of oppressive tyrannies that pepper history), and a distinctly Western individualist ethic (further re-enforcing liberalism) all contribute to the widely-held notion that we have somehow achieved a rather ideal form of government.

There is plenty of debate over what form of Democracy best accomplishes democratic ends -- and we spent much of the early part of this CPS class discussing the trade-offs inherent to different structural and electoral features that characterize modern democracies. And rather naturally, we look upon those countries that seem stunted under authoritarian or autocratic regimes as dangerous or backward to some extent. The oft-repeated attitude of Winston Churchill ("Democracy is the worst form of government except for all those others that have been tried.") is really the one that sticks with us.

Hassner, however, raises the very interesting question of whether this is an appropriate attitude to take. I do not mean to defend the actions of the various autocratic regimes around the world -- certainly most have not achieved a level of peace and stability that many Liberal Democracies have been able to cultivate. It is possible, though, to imagine that different cultural and historical circumstances might lend themselves to the neccessary establishment of a rather autocratic political system.

The tumultuous political history of France is a rather interesting example (and one which Hassner touches upon with his discussion of Charles De Gaulle). In some sense, France still grapples with the historical legacy of both its Monarchy and the powerful chief-executives that occasionally are at odds with strong Republican principles. Napoleoen, De Gaulle, and others give France a history of a strong central leadership and (particularly in the Fifth Republic) have resulted in proportionally more power being allocated to the President (as opposed to, say, Britain's strong Parliamentary streak). It is tempting to lump the world's liberal democracies together to contrast them with less democratic regimes -- but even among the utterly legitimate we see that some cultures may have a strong tendency towards central (and individual) rule. If we continue this spectrum a little further, Putin's rise in Russia may make perfect sense given the social context (and indeed, seems related to Russia's Tsarist past).

It is wrong to justify Putin's various crimes under this banner -- and we certainly cannot declare his violent oppression of various groups legitimate. We might be wise, however, to try to challenge our gut-level take on these autocratic regimes. Even if we hold liberal ideas, we have to acknowledge the wide range of possibilities that even competing liberal values might lead to in forms of government. And we should tailor out attitudes and foreign affairs philosophy to this reality.