Francis Fukuyama is writing a book to say that liberalism is in trouble throughout the world. Excerpts from the book were compiled into an article that came under the title: “A Country of Their own,” and the subtitle: “Liberalism Needs the Nation.” It was published in the May/June 2022 edition of Foreign Affairs.
Fukuyama defines liberalism by its fundamentals, which he
says are tolerance of difference, respect for individual rights, and the rule
of law. Obviously, he means to say that these three principles apply in the
relationship between the state and the individual citizens. In the case of the
law, we might add that respect for the international laws applies as much as
the national laws.
It must be said that when it comes to national laws, no
country is without them. They could be lax or they could be harsh, but the one
thing that must not escape attention, is that the so-called illiberal autocratic
societies respect their own laws as well as the international ones more
strictly than the societies which call themselves liberal. Just look how
America and Israel treat international laws.
As to the reason why a liberal state would violate its
own national law while pretending otherwise — it is to stealthily violate the
individual rights of its citizens. But how does the state do such a thing, and
why would it do it? The most likely reason is to conduct surveillance on its
citizens, fearing that they may be influenced by a foreign power whose system
of beliefs is considered intolerable. This makes it so that in one fell swoop, that
state has violated the three fundamentals of liberalism. Thus, it can be said
with confidence that the so-called liberal societies differ from the autocratic
ones only in the sense that they are hypocritical about what they say and what
they do.
How do these realities affect the political movements
that rise and fall at the national level, and in some cases spill over to
affect even the international scene?
Well, what happens in the self-designated one-party
autocratic states, is that the laws are made as simple and as clear as possible
for all to understand. They are to the effect that political ideas which are
meant to compete against the ruling party will be considered the product of
foreign influence, and designed to destroy the country. The individuals or
groups who engage in this kind of activities, will be considered traitors and
dealt with accordingly. No debate on this subject is allowed. Case closed.
As to what happens in the self-designated democratic
states, the parties seldom define themselves by the relationships they may or
may not have with foreign powers. What they do instead is exaggerate the
differences that exist between them and the other parties with regard to the positions
they take pertaining to local issues. Each party stresses that they alone can
save the country, which happens to be in deep trouble at this crucial moment in
time. They go on to warn that if the other party is elected, they will ruin the
country and make everyone worse off than they are already.
Even if no party manages to bring the entire society to
its point of view, the fear that is generated by the rhetoric of everyone
running for office, scares the people so much, they become selfish and live in
the hope that someone will come and save the country. This is what leads to the
rise of the populist leader who promises to save the country, thus wins enough
of the independent voters to get elected to the highest office in the land. From
that position, he makes the one-sided laws that satisfy his base, but also puts
the nation on a path to an eventual conversion to the autocratic system of
governance.
Whereas this pattern is followed in the old democratic
states, something different took place in the former Eastern European Communist
states that adopted the democratic system of governance. If the saying: ‘Being
mugged by reality’ applies to anyone, it applies to these countries more so
than anywhere else. It is that while under Communism, the people were so
impressed by the propaganda of the Capitalist-Democratic states, they
visualized —
not the realities of those states — but the fantasy they fabricated in their own
imagination about the idyllic life that must exist on the other side of the
divide.
And so, when Communism crumbled, those states converted
to the democratic/capitalist system but found it wanting, and nothing like they
had imagined. It is that the people who didn’t have to compete as in a
dog-eat-dog society to feel secure financially, suddenly discovered that dog
meat in the cutthroat democratic system, tastes awfully close to dog breakfast.
Some of these nations rejected the system of Capitalist Democracy and started
to walk back to the system they thought they had left behind. Other nations
started to experiment with new systems they believe suits their local conditions
better than any existing system. And the jury is still out on these
experiments.
At a time like this, when everything seems to be in flux,
people anchor themselves to what they know best. This would be their culture
and their ethnicity. And so, they define themselves by these traits, and this makes
their behavior look like a surge in nationalism. Some in that society like what
they see, and clamor to make the nationalist situation the permanent state of
their nation.