The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad - Book Report/Review Example

 The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad Introduction In his second book of the future of freedom, FareedZakaria tells us through his thoughts that democracy is not always good. In some situations it may work well while in others, it does not and needs limits to properly function. Fareed who was a former editor of foreign affairs and currently the editor of Newsweek international tells us more about democracy deficiencies. He begins with a reminder that in 1933, Nazis were elected by the Germans. While in the public domain, the western governments are seen to be liberal and democratic, that is they practice separation of powers, abiding by the rule of law and protection of basic human rights the two (being liberal and democratic) do not necessarily go together. He heaps praise on some countries like Mexico and Chile for first liberalizing their economies and later their political structures. He compares them to other third world countries which after independence have proclaimed themselves to be democratic while at the same time being unstable and poor and later on became dictatorships. Zakariastates that something is not right with the democracy in America which he notes has descended into a minded populism that only values openness and popularity. The solution to this type of democracy according to him is having more appointed bodies like the US Supreme Court and the World Trade Organization which are not interfered with by political pressures. He gives us an intellectual framework for several foreign policy dilemmas which he argues that the United States should support liberalizing dictators like Hugo Chavez and Pervez Musharraf. Review When reading through Zakaria’s book, one realizes his attack on democracy, and this is not only in theory but also personal which is quite understandable. The perils of democracy which include the bringing down of elites, debasement of culture and the tyranny of the majority are not in any way Zakaria’s abstractions, but phenomena he experienced while growing up in the streets of Bombay. In his book, he remembers the dominant congress political party which developed from a grass roots organization into an imperial court under the watchful eye of Indira Gandhi whose populist policies were mostly illiberal and unconstitutional. This political party later declined as India’s most dominant party. While many people viewed the emergence of political competition from one party rule in India as promising, Zakaria viewed this as no progress at all. As a result of this democratization of the political system in India, there were more new political parties that vied for the support of new voters. In his view democratization in India proved to be disastrous for the country especially for the Muslim minority. The most lethal challenger for the congress party was the new BharatiyaJanata Party (BJP) which was largely had the Hindu support. He notes that in the many years, the BJP was in the opposition it employed anti-Christian and anti-Muslim tactics to psyche up its supporters. When the BJP came into power although through a somewhat mellowed need for political compromise, it still has been leading a rhetoric of the Hindu nationalist revival. The impacts of these actions, he notes have varied from horrific to an absurd level. For instance in 2002, in Gujarat, the BJP government was conduit to India’s first ever state assisted pogrom where innocent Muslims were massacred in their thousands. Utter Pradesh India’s largest state dominated by the BJP became a sea of illegal deals and corruption. According to Zakaria the Indian justice system had become “a corrupt handmaiden of political power” In his Hometown of Bombay, the city has been damaged by sponsored the Hindu revival to what he now considers a ludicrous Hindu mythology. In 1996, the renaming of Bombay to Mumbai illustrates how far the Hindu Nationalism has gone.This is the sad reality of democracy in India which no one in the western wants to look at it closely. The world describes the beauty of Indians voting and the merits of the world’s largest democracy yet to Zakaria thoughtful Indians do not see it this way. He thinks democracy is responsible for the many evils in this world from poverty, ethnic violence, war, terrorism and even repression which he terms as ‘democratization of violence’ About a third of his book comes from an essay he published in 1997 ‘The rise of Illiberal Democracy’ in Foreign affairs in which he argued that democracy was not appropriate, necessary or even a desirable form of government for many countries around the world. He argued that democratically elected regimes are often ignoring the constitution limits and therefore, denying their citizens basic freedoms and rights. He cites examples from Kazakhstan, Venezuela and Argentina where he claims the experience of democracy in developing countries has been one whereby the majorities have eroded separations of power, corrupted standing traditions and undermined human freedoms and rights. He however, does not mention India, where it seems by his own admission to be an example of an illiberal democracy. In his 1997 essay, he makes a distinction between a liberal democracy like the United States and the illiberal democracies around the developing world. But in this book he devotes most of it to the illiberal democracy in the United States in which he argues that the troubles of democracy in America are similar to those experienced by developing nations across the globe. He argues that majority of Americans are disgusted with the current democratic system and havelost faith in it. They have repulsed it and are undergoing a crisis of faith in governance, and with a good reason, something is seriously wrong with democracy in America.Zakaria notes that the main problem of the American democracy is too much of it; the powerful elites that dominated every segment of the American society have been replaced by ‘simple minded populism’ and thus the disastrous consequences. He goes further to state that the quality of leadership is on a decline, he compares the current president to the one who was there 50 years ago. But democracy manifested in the form of initiatives has taken governance from the hands of the elites to the hands of irresponsible citizenry. For instance Zakaria views the famous tax cutting measure of California in 1978 as terrible since it led to the explosion of citizen movements he has termed as irresponsible. The impacts of democracy extend further beyond politics; it affects religion, law, businesses and culture among others. The United States has suffered from opening up its industries to professional outsiders; Zakaria argues that this is as a result of a financial system strategy of catering to the greater world. He states that there was a time when bankers awarded credit to people with a good character compared to this days where the financial system is dominated by the masses rather than people with class.The issue with democracy has affected even the think tanks. Institutions for instance those on foreign relations where Zakaria worked are dutiful for having developed a foreign policy for a nation that is civil and not infested with partisan politics. But he views this as principally because they think tanks were created by conservatives who were seeking to erect an establishment to challenge the elites but instead of this the conservatives have ended up pushing their partisan lines. He’s solution to this excess of democracy in the United States is to revive in some way the elites and institutions that have been the backbone of America in the past and to get them back to the authority they have lost. In his mind he has the sweeping delegation of cultural, social and economic to the elites rather than the average American, he’s model of a government is based on corporations. He argues that it is utterly ridiculous for an amateur to determine the policies of a country. He points to the European Union where an undemocratic policy making can be preferred instead of the democratic policy making.Zakaria admires the European Union bureaucracy as it is effective precisely because it is protected from political pressures. The United States can learn an important lesson from the European Union as its policy makers should learn to ignore public opinion. In his book, he recounts the story of Odysseus where he orders his men to tie him to his ship so that he could not follow the call and wreck his ship on the rocks. He likens the American people to the sirens the ‘unwashed’ who will stop at nothing in order to destroy their country because the politicians cannot resist their call. The power being held by the American masses should be transferred to the elites and the elites need to grasp it. In Niall Ferguson’s words on the future of freedoms, a classic ‘defense of aristocratic rule’ as an alternative to the democracy in America would perhaps make Zakaria to be brave and make such a case for the conservative counter revolution. Americans have naturally looked at aristocracy and viewed it dimly with the idea that elites that are not elected and protected from politics should assume greater authority to drive the country’s affairs. American elites have been more enthusiastic with such ideas and notably to find someone like ABC’s Peter Jennings praising Zakaria’s book will not be surprising. Although he is courageous to cast the harsh reality on the evils of democracy, he oddly claims that he is not against democratic and that he only wants to protect it from its worst tendencies. His critique of democracy holds no barred indictment it is instead damning. That he rarely praises it is not all convincingconsidering it has overwhelmingly tremendous consequences. Majority of the readers may be coming across this argument for the exactfirst time andZakaria’sbulk analysis of the developing world is a recycling of what simply used to be known as ‘modernization theory’ three decades ago. The hypothesis of the modernization theory was at first having an authoritarian government that was better than a democracy promoting industrialization and economic growth as prerequisites for the success of a democracy. In the late 1950’s many political scientists had a conclusion that democracies were an obstacle to economic growth, this was because populist pressures forced governments not to make the most efficient decisions. A populist government would have led to inflation with budget deficits and thus leading to a slow economic growth. The most accepted solution was to have more dictatorship and less democracy. Adam Przeworski a political scientist describes the theory of modernization as a ‘benign line’ that is like running from an economically successful dictatorship to democracy. His point is dictatorship generates development and development would in turn create democracy. For Zakaria, the correlation between democracy and economic success is a pillar for his argument on dictatorship as the mode of government for the developing world. Zakaria’s other pillar of ant-democratic theory draws the argument that all developing nations ‘order’ must come after ‘liberty’ In every nation the citizenry and their leaders share a common vision of public interest and the traditions upon which the political class is based. The Soviet Union and the United states had coherent, adaptable and strong political structures, well organized parties, effective bureaucracies and high level of popular participation in affairs of the public. These two countries also commanded the loyalties of their countrymen. Conclusion When countries that are not ready for democracy adopt it, then democracy becomes pernicious not only for the citizen of a country in which it is implemented unwisely. Proliferation of illiberal democracies Zakaria argues is the greatest threat in the world today, greater than tyrannies of the world. This ‘illiberal democracy’ gained his foreign affairs article considerable attention which in turn, was his principal contribution to the political development. References Fareed.Z (2007).The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad (Revised Edition)W. W. Norton Carafano, J. J. (2008). Private sector, public wars: Contractors in combat-- Afghanistan, Iraq, and future conflicts. Westport, Conn: Praeger Security International. Sharansky, N., &Dermer, R. (2004).The case for democracy: The power of freedom to overcome tyranny and terror. New York: PublicAffairs. Crocker, C. A., Hampson, F. O., &Aall, P. R. (2007).Leashing the dogs of war: Conflict management in a divided world. Washington: United States Institute of Peace Press. Read More