As we face a battle of ideas with autocracies, the traditional ringing justifications of democracy no longer carry much credence. Instead we have an uncertain, defensive debate about populism.
These days when people say "democracy" they really seem to mean, "rule by an interconnected web of institutions, both national, international and non-governmental, with significant input by universities and the media." I.e., rule by credentialed elites. That is why they can say, with a straight face, things like "we need to impose restrictions on speech to save democracy", or "on this election, democracy is on the ballot."
"democracy" means rule by credentialed elites with some token parcipation of the masses via the ballot box.
"populism" is the specter of what happens when the masses get what they want (e.g. stopping immigration, or stopping Western countries from funding wars in the Middle East and with Russia).
You will find absolutely zero tolerance for Putin-sympathisers from me, and the claim that the “masses want” us to abandon Ukraine is a straight-up lie.
Eh, I think it’s fair to worry that autocrats like Orban or Erdogan subvert democracy, and that others might. It’s not enough to have elections every 4 years if you’ve bought the press and jailed or intimidated your opponents.
You mean the university that was founded by Soros as an indoctrination center?
Frankly, I suspect that university was only ever the "best" in the same sense that 2024 Harvard is the "best", only without even the historical prestige of the latter.
Well. The masses want such rightish things, yes, but they also want leftish things like more redistribution and higher minimum wage and more state services. True populism is always a mixture of left and right stuff: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Star_Movement
True populism is a mixture of left and right stuff that have, for the elites, an authoritarian feel, they reduce people's personal freedoms such as freedom to come in your country or freedom to keep their wealth from taxation or the freedom to run their business as they see fit. Elitism is a blend of left-liberalism and right-liberalism, both anti-authoritarian. Remember, elites hated and Caesar's dictatorship, the people loved him.
Populism is a blend of left-authoritarianism and right-authoritarianism. That is because for the masses, personal freedom does not really exist, it is an elitist idea. "Work or starve" is not meaningful freedom. "you can choose from the three employers who are willing to hire you, all three jobs suck equally" is not meaningful freedom. "you are free to spend your time not slaved to your job whichever way you can afford to spend, which is very few options" is not meaningful freedom.
These days when people say "democracy" they really seem to mean, "rule by an interconnected web of institutions, both national, international and non-governmental, with significant input by universities and the media." I.e., rule by credentialed elites. That is why they can say, with a straight face, things like "we need to impose restrictions on speech to save democracy", or "on this election, democracy is on the ballot."
"democracy" means rule by credentialed elites with some token parcipation of the masses via the ballot box.
"populism" is the specter of what happens when the masses get what they want (e.g. stopping immigration, or stopping Western countries from funding wars in the Middle East and with Russia).
You will find absolutely zero tolerance for Putin-sympathisers from me, and the claim that the “masses want” us to abandon Ukraine is a straight-up lie.
True, that said, his description of how the word "democracy" tends to be used in practice is unfortunately correct.
Eh, I think it’s fair to worry that autocrats like Orban or Erdogan subvert democracy, and that others might. It’s not enough to have elections every 4 years if you’ve bought the press and jailed or intimidated your opponents.
Orban is only considered an "autocrat" because he rules according to popular will and not that of the technocratic managerial oligarchy.
“Popular will”. See above. He drove out the region’s best university.
Precisely. The university is the power center of internationalist credentialed elites.
And do you think the majority has a problem with that? The majority only cares about wages and crime.
You mean the university that was founded by Soros as an indoctrination center?
Frankly, I suspect that university was only ever the "best" in the same sense that 2024 Harvard is the "best", only without even the historical prestige of the latter.
Well. The masses want such rightish things, yes, but they also want leftish things like more redistribution and higher minimum wage and more state services. True populism is always a mixture of left and right stuff: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Star_Movement
True populism is a mixture of left and right stuff that have, for the elites, an authoritarian feel, they reduce people's personal freedoms such as freedom to come in your country or freedom to keep their wealth from taxation or the freedom to run their business as they see fit. Elitism is a blend of left-liberalism and right-liberalism, both anti-authoritarian. Remember, elites hated and Caesar's dictatorship, the people loved him.
Populism is a blend of left-authoritarianism and right-authoritarianism. That is because for the masses, personal freedom does not really exist, it is an elitist idea. "Work or starve" is not meaningful freedom. "you can choose from the three employers who are willing to hire you, all three jobs suck equally" is not meaningful freedom. "you are free to spend your time not slaved to your job whichever way you can afford to spend, which is very few options" is not meaningful freedom.
That's because what we call democracy is clearly fake. It is not the people actually ruling or making decisions. It is elitist expertocracy.