Daily Times

A great fear in the West is the decline of liberal democracies paralleled with the rise of authoritarianism and fascism. The causes of this decline are often portrayed as populism stirred by anti-immigrant sentiment and a fear that globalisation will lead to the West’s local populace losing jobs to immigrants. These are in fact — the symptoms — not the causes of this political phenomenon. History offers an insight into a ‘great illusion’ which had occurred earlier in time.

In 1910, author and later knighted Nobel Laureate Norman Angell argued in The Great Illusion that war among industrialised states had become obsolete for two reasons. The first argument was that occupying or annexing territory of neighbouring states made no economic sense. And second, war among industrialised states would prove so costly and destructive that it was no longer feasible.

Angell’s ‘great illusion’ thesis was demolished in August 1914, when a handful of bullets fired in Sarajevo earlier that June murdering Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie triggered World War I. Similarly, the flaw in the current thesis of the decline of Western liberal democracies and the rise of authoritarian power is that it ignores the fundamental cause. Without understanding the cause, solutions for reversing this condition will almost certainly not work.

The fundamental cause of the so-called decline of democracies are their failed and failing governments. Whether in the United States or other states around the world, governments are not providing their public with the acceptable levels of governance. The US is such a case in point.

The political system of checks and balances is dependent on compromise and civility. Of course, politics has often swerved away from both. Yet, a righting force persisted.

The most profound question for the United States is whether a political system invented by the best minds of the 18th century can weather the storms and realities of the 21st

Today, because American political parties have been captured by the more extreme elements of the left and right, and since money plays an influential role, governance has become focused on election and re-election in a binary political system, creating an ‘us versus them’ narrative in both parties. The threat of losing a majority in Congress and consignment to a minority status of ‘wilderness’ has caused dozens of Republicans this year to stand down. If the situation were reversed, Democrats would do the same.

Furthermore, social media and cable news reinforce this polarisation much more than two centuries ago, when Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton bought duelling newspapers to hammer each other. Uncontrolled debt and deficits; growing gaps between the rich and others including a shrinking middle class; and the vulgarity of politics have invoked not just invoked scepticism about governance. Americans are genuinely cynical and frightened about the future.

This fear, induced by the escalating cost of living for virtually everything but especially health care, education and retirement, has led to anger that is quickly turning into outrage. That outrage is manifested in the protests over guns by Parkland students and the #MeToo movement over sexual harassment. And sadly, American politics still stress the four ‘G’s’: guns, gays, god and gestation periods as litmus tests.

Failure to govern has produced a broken and gridlocked government.

The same phenomena are manifested in other democracies. The UK, France and Germany suffer from similarly failing governments. In part, authoritarian shifts in Hungary, Austria and Poland are responses to this. Especially since China and Russia seem to be advancing under authoritarian rule.

The most profound question for the United States is whether a political system invented by the best minds of the 18th century can weather the storms and realities of the 21st. Given the pernicious and septic nature of American politics, and the almost irreconcilable differences between both parties, the only forcing function for compromise and reconciliation could be a crisis as severe as the Great Depression or the attack on Pearl Harbour. And whether the nation could deal with such a trauma is uncertain as well.

Since most Western democracies are parliamentary, in theory, a party with a ruling majority could govern. But many European governments have a coalition or minority party rule, limiting the authority of prime ministers. Hence, a real crisis over the ability of liberal democracies to govern is not an idle question.

The alternative is one party rule. China, Russia, Vietnam, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States and Singapore are examples. Yet each has potential flaws in the ability to cope with the demands and centrifugal forces in each society.

“What is to be done?” as Lenin famously asked may be the most challenging question facing the world’s publics, as failed and failing governments pose the greatest universal threat to modern civilisation. That this question can be satisfactorily answered may be the greatest illusion of all.

The writer is the principal author of Shock And Awe and Distinguished Senior Fellow and Visiting Professor at the US Naval War College. His latest book is Anatomy of Failure — Why America Loses Every War It Starts. He is @harlankullman. These views are his and do not represent any institution with which he is affiliated

Published in Daily Times, April 23^rd 2018.