April 3, 2018--"How Democracies Die"
In a powerful book of that name, distinguished Harvard professors of government, Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, worry that the election of Donald Trump is unleashing his and America's totalitarian impulses.
They set their analysis in a comparative context with considerable attention paid to the decline and at times death of democracies in, among other countries, Mussolini's Italy, Hitler's Germany, Peron's Argentina Chavez's Venezuela, Pinochet's Chile, Erdogan's Turkey, and Marcos's Philippines.
But the central focus is on the history of threats to democracy in the United States--the Civil War; the post-Reconstruction, Jim Crow era of institutionalized racism; the McCarthy threat; and now Trumpian times.
About America their analysis includes the gathering number of ways Trump is challenging the very notion of democracy itself and how he is systematically undermining it further by exploiting people's fears of the "other" and the internal and external dangers that they see around them, including a rigged electoral system, a corrupt judiciary, an unfettered press, a compromised legislative process, a debasement of our culture, and the political opposition treasonous.
The book, though comfortably readable, includes a great deal of data to advance its arguments, including some that are unusual, even quirky but metaphorically illuminate the nature of the problem and its near total reach.
From the chapter, "The Unraveling," about our growing polarization--
They set their analysis in a comparative context with considerable attention paid to the decline and at times death of democracies in, among other countries, Mussolini's Italy, Hitler's Germany, Peron's Argentina Chavez's Venezuela, Pinochet's Chile, Erdogan's Turkey, and Marcos's Philippines.
But the central focus is on the history of threats to democracy in the United States--the Civil War; the post-Reconstruction, Jim Crow era of institutionalized racism; the McCarthy threat; and now Trumpian times.
About America their analysis includes the gathering number of ways Trump is challenging the very notion of democracy itself and how he is systematically undermining it further by exploiting people's fears of the "other" and the internal and external dangers that they see around them, including a rigged electoral system, a corrupt judiciary, an unfettered press, a compromised legislative process, a debasement of our culture, and the political opposition treasonous.
The book, though comfortably readable, includes a great deal of data to advance its arguments, including some that are unusual, even quirky but metaphorically illuminate the nature of the problem and its near total reach.
From the chapter, "The Unraveling," about our growing polarization--
Consider this extraordinary finding: In 1960, political scientists asked Americans how they would feel if their children married someone who identified with another political party. Four percent of Democrats and five percent of Republicans reported they would be "displeased."
In 2010, by contrast, 33 percent of Democrats and 49 percent of Republicans reported feeling "somewhat or very unhappy" at the prospect of inter-party marriage.
Being a Democrat or a Republican has become not just a partisan affiliation but an identity.
(Iyengar, Sood, and Lelkes, "Affect, Not Ideology: A Social Identity Perspective on Polarization")None of this will help one sleep at night, but we need to be warned and find ways to resist.
Labels: "How Democracies Die", American Democracy, Civil War, Erdogan, Hitler, Marcos, McCarthy, Mussolini, Pinochet, Steven Levitsky, Totalitarian, Ziblatt
posted by Steven Zwerling at
4:19 AM
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