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11. The Populist Challenge to Liberal Democracy

Author:
William A. Galston
Publication Date:
04-2018
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Democracy
Institution:
National Endowment for Democracy
Abstract:
Across the West, economic dislocation and demographic change have triggered a demand for strong leaders. This surge of populism is more than an emotional backlash; it encourages a political structure that threatens liberal democracy. While populism accepts principles of popular sovereignty and majoritarianism, it is skeptical about constitutionalism and liberal protections for individuals. Moreover, populists’ definition of “the people” as homogeneous cannot serve as the basis for a modern democracy, which stands or falls with the protection of pluralism. Although this resurgent tribalism may draw strength from the incompleteness of life in liberal society, the liberal-democratic system uniquely harbors the power of self-correction, the essential basis for needed reforms.
Topic:
Corruption, Democracy, Populism, and Liberal Order
Political Geography:
Europe and North America

12. Explaining Eastern Europe: The Crisis of Liberalism

Author:
Jacques Rupnik
Publication Date:
07-2018
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Democracy
Institution:
National Endowment for Democracy
Abstract:
Thirty years ago in Central and Eastern Europe, belief in an open society and a sense of reasserted national and indeed European identity seemed to go hand-in-hand. Today this has changed: Through the combination of the rise of “illiberal democracy” and heightened concerns about identity in the face of the migrant wave, the authoritarian and sovereigntist turn in Central Europe has revealed a rupture in the fabric of the European Union. This draws to a close the post-1989 liberal cycle, but perhaps also the longer cycle associated with the Enlightenment, which is now more than two-hundred years old.
Topic:
Nationalism, European Union, Democracy, Liberal Order, Post Cold War, and Illiberal Democracy
Political Geography:
Europe

13. EU Foreign Policy in a Networked World: Webs against power politics

Author:
Kristi Raik
Publication Date:
10-2018
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
The liberal, norms-based international order is being challenged by two contradicting trends: the rise of power politics and geopolitical conflicts, on the one hand, and the diffusion of power and increased importance of networks, on the other. This paper explores how increased connectivity is shaping the agenda and practice of EU foreign policy and re-defining the traditional tensions between realist and liberal approaches to global politics. It argues that the EU should develop foreign policy strategies that utilise networks as an asset against power politics, looking at two examples of how a network-based approach can help the EU to defend its values and interests: networks for resilience against hybrid threats, and networks for supporting Ukraine. These cases shed light on how the concept of networks can contribute to the EU’s strategy in today’s fluid global politics and unstable regional security environment.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Regional Cooperation, European Union, and Liberal Order
Political Geography:
Europe and Ukraine

14. The Signs of Deconsolidation

Author:
Roberto Stefan Foa and Yascha Mounk
Publication Date:
01-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Democracy
Institution:
National Endowment for Democracy
Abstract:
In recent years, parties and candidates challenging key democratic norms have won unprecedented popular support in liberal democracies across the globe. Drawing on public opinion data from the World Values Survey and various national polls, we show that the success of anti-establishment parties and candidates is not a temporal or geographic aberration, but rather a reflection of growing popular disaffection with liberal-democratic norms and institutions, and of increasing support for authoritarian interpretations of democracy. The record number of anti-system politicians in office raises uncertainty about the strength of supposedly “consolidated” liberal democracies and highlights the need for further analysis of the signs of democratic deconsolidation.
Topic:
Democracy, Liberal Order, Norms, and Deconsolidation
Political Geography:
Global Focus

15. The 2016 U.S. Election: The Populist Moment

Author:
William A. Galston
Publication Date:
04-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Democracy
Institution:
National Endowment for Democracy
Abstract:
In the United States and abroad, a populist surge threatens the assumptions and achievements of politicians and policy makers from mainstream parties. In the United States, populist discontents have been fueled by an array of factors, including the Great Recession that resulted from the 2008 financial crisis; the failure of past reforms to stem the tide of illegal immigration over the country’s southern border; the economic consequences of sweeping technological change; and the rise of an education-based meritocracy that has left less-educated citizens in outlying towns and rural areas feeling denigrated and devalued. Today, some parties on both the left and right are calling into question the norms and institutions of liberal democracy itself. Growing insecurity has triggered a demand for strong leaders, and forms of authoritarianism that many believed had been left behind for good a quarter-century ago are threatening to resurface. These developments illuminate the historical case for liberal democracy, as well as the sources of its current weakness.
Topic:
Financial Crisis, Elections, Populism, and Liberal Order
Political Geography:
United States and North America

16. The Pipe Dream of Undemocratic Liberalism

Author:
Sheri Berman
Publication Date:
07-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Democracy
Institution:
National Endowment for Democracy
Abstract:
Over the past decade illiberal democracy has spread across the globe. Many analysts argue that democracy itself is to blame. Democracy is all about empowering the people, but, according to this line of argument, the people can be moved by passions and self-interest, and their unchecked rule can lead to tyrannical majoritarianism. While illiberal democracy is certainly worrying, many of its critics fundamentally misunderstand how democracy has traditionally developed and what its historical relationship with liberalism has been. Rather than the norm, liberal democracy has been the exception. Moreover, illiberal democracy is most often a stage on the route to liberal democracy rather than the endpoint of a country’s political trajectory. In addition, although democracy unchecked by liberalism can slide into tyrannical majoritarianism, liberalism unchecked by democracy can easily deteriorate into elitist oligarchy.
Topic:
Democracy, Liberal Order, Elites, and Illiberal Democracy
Political Geography:
Global Focus

17. The Kremlin Emboldened: What Is Putinism?

Author:
M. Steven Fish
Publication Date:
10-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Democracy
Institution:
National Endowment for Democracy
Abstract:
Under Vladimir Putin, Russia’s ruling class again claims to represent a superior alternative to liberal democracy. How can we theorize this regime? Putinism is a form of autocracy that is conservative, populist, and personalistic. Its conservatism means that Putinism prioritizes maintaining the status quo and avoiding instability. Conservatism also overlaps with Putinism’s populism in crowd-pleasing broadsides against gay rights and feminism, but gives that populism a distinct cast when it comes to questions of social spending and interethnic or interconfessional relations. Finally, as a personalist autocracy, Putinism rests on one-man rule. Yet the identification of the regime with a single person may fatally undermine Putinism’s effectiveness in its self-appointed role as a bulwark against upheaval.
Topic:
Authoritarianism, Democracy, Liberal Order, and Conservatism
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Eastern Europe

18. After Liberal Hegemony: The Advent of a Multiplex World Order

Author:
Amitav Acharya
Publication Date:
09-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Carnegie Council
Abstract:
“The dominance of a single great power,” wrote American scholar Robert Keohane in his widely acclaimed book After Hegemony, “may contribute to order in world politics, in particular circumstances, but it is not a sufficient condition and there is little reason to believe that it is necessary.”1 This proposition has never been put to a greater test as it is now. Since the election of Donald J. Trump as U.S. president in November 2016 there has been a vast outpouring of anxiety over the future of the liberal world order.2 But the myths, limitations, and decline of this order have been anticipated and forewarned for some time, even though its proponents have not acknowledged it. The “first myth” about the U.S.-led liberal hegemonic order, as I have written elsewhere, is “how far it extended for much of its history, especially during the Cold War period.” I pointed out that “the Soviet bloc, China, India, Indonesia, and a good part of the ‘third world’ were outside of it . . . . Despite the exalted claims about its power, legitimacy, and public goods functions, that order was little more than the US-UK-West Europe-Australasian configuration.”3 Noting that the liberal order was hardly benign for many countries in the developing world, I argued that it should be seen as a limited international order, rather than an inclusive global order. Joseph S. Nye, one of the staunchest champions of the liberal order, made a similar point when he wrote in the January/February 2017 issue of Foreign Affairs that the liberal order “was largely limited to a group of like-minded states centered on the Atlantic littoral” and “did not include many large countries such as China, India, and the Soviet bloc states, and . . . did not always have benign effects on nonmembers.”4 The liberal order did expand and strengthen with the economic reforms in China and India, and with the end of the cold war. And while the champions of that order celebrated its expansion, they still generally assumed that the main challenge to it would come from the rising powers, led by China. Their assumptions notwithstanding, precisely at a time when many of these powers today are not doing all that well, the liberal order appears to be imploding. Trump’s victory and Brexit suggest that the current challenge to the liberal order is as much, if not more, from within as from without. Precisely at a time when many of the rising powers are not doing all that well, the liberal order appears to be imploding. The domestic challenges to the liberal order led by Trump and his supporters could be overstated, however. After all, Hillary Clinton won a majority of the popular vote, and the Brexit referendum only passed by a slim margin. More importantly, however, the crisis of the liberal order has deeper roots, owing to long-term and structural changes in the global economy and politics. As such, Trump’s ascent to power is a consequence—not a cause—of the decline of the liberal order, especially of its failure to address the concerns of domestic constituents left behind by the global power shift. Given these factors, Trump is unlikely to reverse the decline of the liberal order even if he wanted to. Instead, he may well push it over the precipice. In what follows, I first describe the foundations of the liberal order, and show that the ground on which it was built has been eroding for some time, though Trump’s rhetoric and policies are also damaging. Next, I argue that for now the rising powers are not in a position to overturn the current order completely, and in fact they may wish to preserve some elements of it in the near and medium term. I describe a “multiplex world” in which elements of the liberal order survive, but are subsumed in a complex of multiple, crosscutting international orders. Finally, I offer some suggestions on how scholars and policymakers can manage the transition to such a multiplex world.
Topic:
International Cooperation, Hegemony, Reform, and Liberal Order
Political Geography:
Global Focus

19. The Specter Haunting Europe: Distinguishing Liberal Democracy’s Challengers

Author:
Takis S. Pappas
Publication Date:
10-2016
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Democracy
Institution:
National Endowment for Democracy
Abstract:
This article takes issue with the common practice of uncritically lumping together as “populist” the various and distinct challengers to democracy in contemporary Europe. It disaggregates and then classifies such challengers into three analytically distinct categories: antidemocrats, nativists, and populists. In so doing, the article reveals the geographical distribution of these categories across Europe, and highlights the value of treating each category based on its unique set of symptoms. It further shows that the gravest threat to contemporary liberalism comes from populist rather than from antidemocratic or nativist parties.
Topic:
Democracy, Populism, Liberal Order, Nativism, and Post Cold War
Political Geography:
Europe