My reading list part 5

I purchased How Democracies Die:  What History Reveals About Our Future by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt (2018, Penguin Books) expecting and hoping for something more.  The authors are professors of government at Harvard University.

At the outset, How Democracies Die examined how democracies in South America (Chile, Venezuela and Argentina among others) and Africa transformed into autocracies.  Perhaps why this was so interesting was the passage of time.  In every case, there was not a transformational moment.  The changes occurred gradually, legally and, in several cases, perhaps monomaniacally.

But the true purpose of this text became apparent in chapters two through four.  It is here where the authors begin to make their case that President Trump is following in the fine tradition of Pinochet, Chavez, Maduro, Bucaram, Lugo and many others.    Afterwards, we return to an analysis of  the antecedents and the factors that led to a dismantling of democracy in their various countries.  The book then returns to American democracy, the historical principles a democratic society, a review of how those principles are being frittered away in America before President is placed squarely into focus.

According to the authors, there are three main factors here.  One is systemic on how an autocrat can change the rules of a democracy to fit his or her needs.  The other is based on the unwritten rules of democracy of which the United States have many.  Think of the latter as a common law for leadership.   The final one is attitudinal.

Changing the rules can include altering the composition of the Supreme Court, changing the basis of any needed majority (e.g. from a bare majority to a super majority of 75%), or, to altering the restrictions applicable to a leader.  One example of this was Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s quest for more than two presidential terms (but more on this in a moment).

The unwritten rules or conventions of American democracy can take the form of necessary rules, and even trivial ones.  Of the latter, the authors point out that President Trump contravened the convention that presidents maintain a pet.  I’m not sure there is any merit to this point except to point out a breach.  Another convention was that presidents shall not serve more than two  terms.  This unwritten rule of American government goes back to George Washington but did not need to be included in the US Constitution until after Franklin Roosevelt passed away.  Another unwritten rule of democracy is that political  opponents are to treat each other with respect, if only because one will never know when bilateral support is needed.  Whether this is a problem of President Trump’s term remains open to debate.  The book was published in 2018.  Since then we have borne witness to several “come downs” from Trump’s Campaign rhetoric.

To the authors’ credit, they admit that whatever ills they can find in President Trump in this regard did not begin with him.  There were several presidents, senators and congressmen who started America on what can only be described as an anti-democratic slippery slope, but this is a recent phenomenon.  I am not a Trump supporter, tut the focus remains, unfairly I believe, on Trump, notwithstanding the admission that Trump has been precluded from contravening conventions.

The final issue is attitude, but I think this is the main impetus of any autocrat.  Here is, what it seems to me, to be the main thrust of any argument.  Any democracy will be doomed when a leader is elected who is more interested in personal power than public purpose regardless of whether the politician sets a course for being either a benevolent or malevolent dictator.

How Democracies Die began as an intriguing title and started out with much promise until it turned out to be something else.  Although I read this book last week over a twenty-four hour period, my enthusiasm waned the more political science gave way to the polemics du jour.  What I wanted more of was a diagnostic checklist for any democracy’s potential demise.  It’s in the book, only it is not set out explicitly as it is hidden amidst the authors’ attack on the current US government.