The 8th Circle

Lately, I’ve been running into what seems to be a popular argument nowadays about the viability and future of democracy, which is supposedly undermined by a new emerging governing model based on the Chinese and Russian experience of authoritarian capitalism and “sovereign democracy” respectively.

The latest such claim - Democracy in Decline - is made by Tony Blankley. It’s a very brief column, too brief for the claim it makes, organized something like this:

1. History of democracy
2. Democracy’s culmination at the end of the Cold War (i.e. end of history argument)
3. Recent travel by T. Blankley sows doubts about whether democracy will survive in the long-term
4. Proof: Russia and China
5. Digression (Conclusion?): the Irish vote

I originally intended to offer my two cents on this, but reading through the comments on this piece I defer to those already articulated. Below are just two exerpts, but I encourage you first to read Blankley’s column so as to give it a fair appraisal.

Comment #1 (by Russell1):

Tony: I always enjoy your views on Left, Right & Center. But I’m confused by your point. You give us your inside-observation of the move away from democracy in Russia and China (two places where democracy has no history). And you indicate that democracy in the West (where it has a long tradition) may be an historical aberration. Yet you revel in the Irish choice to keep mom-and-pop democracy alive in Western Europe. Are these counter-trends or part of the same anti-democratic movement? Or unrelated, in which case I’m really confused as to your larger point. Perhaps you’ll clear it all up on Friday’s show. At least now I know where you’ve been! –Russell

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Comment #6 (by jdesai)

Interesting generalization based on visiting two large authoritarian countries. It would have been good for you to have wandered into India after Russia and China. You would see that democracy is deeply entrenched in a country of 1 billion with so much diversity that it is amazing multiple centrifugal forces don’t tear it apart everyday. This is not to say that all is well. There is a strong streak of authoritarianism within the political parties and in public and private life, and democracy still is largely electoral and not functional within political institutions, but you wouldn’t find too many political scientists arguing that democracy is on the decline in India.