H (trying to keep up with GR friends) Balikov's Reviews > How Democracies Die: What History Reveals About Our Future

Below is how the authors see the need for this book and its purpose:

“This is how we tend to think of democracies dying: at the hands of men with guns. During the Cold War, coups d’état accounted for nearly three out of every four democratic breakdowns. Democracies in Argentina, Brazil, the Dominican Republic, Ghana, Greece, Guatemala, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, Thailand, Turkey, and Uruguay all died this way. More recently, military coups toppled Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi in 2013 and Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra in 2014. In all these cases, democracy dissolved in spectacular fashion, through military power and coercion. But there is another way to break a democracy. It is less dramatic but equally destructive. Democracies may die at the hands not of generals but of elected leaders—presidents or prime ministers who subvert the very process that brought them to power. Some of these leaders dismantle democracy quickly, as Hitler did in the wake of the 1933 Reichstag fire in Germany. More often, though, democracies erode slowly, in barely visible steps…

“American politicians now treat their rivals as enemies, intimidate the free press, and threaten to reject the results of elections. They try to weaken the institutional buffers of our democracy, including the courts, intelligence services, and ethics offices. American states, which were once praised by the great jurist Louis Brandeis as “laboratories of democracy,” are in danger of becoming laboratories of authoritarianism as those in power rewrite electoral rules, redraw constituencies, and even rescind voting rights to ensure that they do not lose. And in 2016, for the first time in U.S. history, a man with no experience in public office, little observable commitment to constitutional rights, and clear authoritarian tendencies was elected president.”

Their data and conclusions, particularly on the USA, appear solid. Thus, the reader is not going to emerge with optimism about either where we are, or where we are going. The authors point out that we may have moved away from the American Creed but there is a road back. The American Creed? “---The principles of individual freedom and egalitarianism.” Also, “Mutual toleration and institutional forbearance are procedural principles---they tell politicians how to behave, beyond the bounds of law, to make institutions function. We should regard these procedural values as also sitting at the center of the American Creed---for without them, our democracy would not work.”

The authors definitely see the current Trump Administration as an anti-democratic challenge that needs to be addressed. To correct this, they suggest that “Anti-Trump forces should build a broad prodemocratic coalition,” because, “If Trump is defeated via democratic institutions, it will strengthen those institutions.” The authors see the need to “foster more crosscutting allegiances…” Because, “when we agree with our political rivals at least some of the time, we are less likely to view them as mortal enemies.” Is this new? Is this sufficient? I leave it to other readers to discuss what is the best way forward.

Thanks to my GR friend Jean for pointing me in this direction. This is truly a time of great challenge for democracies. 4.5*