By Yoke Clara Yansim / August 21, 2021
| As the Cold War drew to a close, Francis Fukuyama proclaimed the victory of Western liberal democracy and capitalism. However, global freedom has been steadily on the decline for more than a decade. |
As the Cold War drew to a close, Francis Fukuyama’s famous 1989 article “The End of History?” proclaimed the victory of liberal democracy and capitalism. Fukuyama argued that the freedom advocated by the US and its allies was the final destination of all people, and totalitarianism had lost the ideological war.
But others were not so optimistic.
Fukuyama’s prediction for the “end of history” hinged on the assumption that history moves linearly, that the future is an extrapolation of contemporary trends. This prediction, however, may be premature. Louis Menand wrote in The New Yorker that the present would create “backlashes and reshuffling of the social deck”.
The State of Liberal Democracy Now
The 1990s saw the US’ biggest Cold War enemies, Russia and China, seemingly on a path towards political and economic liberalism, but the reality cannot be further today. China under Xi Jinping’s rule has obliterated all hopes of it democratising domestically, contrary to Larry Diamond’s prediction in 2012. Vladimir Putin’s presidency in Russia also reversed whatever little progress the country has made in democratic transition.
If anything, the examples of China and Russia illustrate a rising trend of personalist authoritarianism. In such a system, decision-making is concentrated in one person with few checks and balances. The personalist trend is also seen in democracies, creating “delegative” or “illiberal” democracies.
Freedom House reported that 2020 was the 15th consecutive year of global freedom deterioration. Far from the situation in the early 2010s, authoritarian regimes that had embarked on some form of liberalisation – Thailand and Myanmar, for example – have backslid towards authoritarianism and failed to consolidate as democracies. Borrowing from Samuel P. Huntington, it seems that the third reverse wave of democratisation is here.
This gradual decline reinforces the notion that liberal democracy is losing ground around the world, especially its effectiveness as a political system.
The indecisiveness of democracies at the beginning of the pandemic illustrates the apparent problem: liberal democracy is impractical in a crisis, while autocracy delivers results. The deliberative style of democratic decision-making, though beneficial under normal circumstances, seems unnecessarily limiting compared to the swiftness of autocracy.
However, further evidence shows that democracies are no less capable than autocracies of acting firmly if necessary. Democracies perform better in the long run due to their accountability to the people. In containing coronavirus, democracies are more likely to use proportionate measures in terms of freedom restrictions, according to the Freedom House.
Democracy Is Not Dead
Though in decline, the idea of liberal democracy is still an aspiration for many people. Mass protests for democracy around the world continue to grow despite increased repression.
The Winston Churchill quote comes to mind: “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.”
In your opinion, is liberal democracy necessarily the ideal form of governance? Is there appeal in autocracy?
This article was written for Loop Media.
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