THE DICTATORSHIP OF DEMOCRACY

Liberal democracy is doomed. Though President Bush promotes democracy as a solution to what is wrong in the world, he is overlooking a very important point. Not all democratic societies are successful, and not all non-democratic ones are failures. Democracy is a process, a very important one, whereby people can realize in their governments the values and principles they hold dear. The government and society that results from this process, then, is only as good as the values of the people participating in this process. People with lousy values will get lousy governments, and this will lead to lousy social conditions. In these cases, a more or less benevolent despot, if this is not oxymoronic, may be preferable to selfish, corrupt, popularly elected governments, of which we are all too familiar.

The democratic processes that have taken place not too long ago in Afghanistan and Iraq, and in light of the events we are now witnessing, may very well demonstrate the point. Those people are quite likely getting the governments and societies they well deserve. To see Muslim mobs worldwide calling with impunity for the death of cartoonists as well as a former Muslim man who converted to Christianity, and chanting "Death to Christians", only shows how little they understand liberal democratic principles. How worrisome would a similar thing have been in the West had the crowds been European and shouting "Death to Muslims" or "Death to Jews"? What is more disconcerting is the paucity of condemnation on the part of so-called moderate Muslims and their governments. Even these moderates, while critical, perhaps, of the violent methods of the fanatics, still see themselves on the same side. In this conflict of "us versus them" the religious bonds remain stronger than any ideological ones.

The Paradox of Tolerance

The singular fault of liberal democracy is that the seeds of its own destruction are planted within its very principles. That makes it ultimately a doomed political philosophy. Liberal democracy as it is presently conceived permits under the principle of free speech, for example, the advocacy of non-democratic values or practices. It is only necessary then, to convince a majority of people to adopt these values and practices to effectively kill the "liberal" part of liberal democracy. We've seen this when people had freely voted for non-democratic candidates in Germany in 1933 and recently in Iraq, Iran, Palestine and just about everywhere else in the Muslim world apart from a few exceptions. The free election of National Socialist candidates in 1933, and of the Islamic fundamentalist candidates today who have established Sharia Law, effectively denying to many of their citizens the basic human rights that people in the west take so much for granted, only underscores the paradox of tolerant, liberal democracy. In principle, tolerance must permit intolerance. This is not so the other way around.

In liberal, western countries the exercise of democracy has had its own paradoxical effects. Here, it would be the exercise of democracy devoid of values — understand that as religious or moral values — that creates the paradox. The reflex to invoke the principle of the separation between religion and government as a pretext to oppose the establishment of any law even remotely inspired by religious, moral sentiment creates a society where it is only necessary to have a majority in order to enjoy a right. I believe, for example, that most western societies still hold as true that polygamy is immoral, or for that matter pedophilia, but for how much longer? If a majority of people can be persuaded to regard these practices as acceptable, as many have with non-marital sexual relations, abortion, drug use or homosexuality, then the principles of democracy should logically allow these types of behaviors. But then, there is no limit to what the democratic process would allow. It permits, for example, free speech, but without pronouncing on whether the ideas expressed in that speech are right or wrong. It allows a woman to abort her fetus, but does not say whether doing so is good or bad. It permits or disallows certain behaviors, but without any pronouncement on the morality of said behaviors. Western type, secular governments, are under the command of their electorate, but also at their whim. Ultimately, this whimsy could also permit to take hold Islamic republics, People's Republics or National Socialism. Successful democratic societies are held, then, by the thread of the basic decency and values of its citizens. Democracy can paradoxically lead to the opposite extremes of either cohesive, repressive, ideologically based societies or fractured, libertine, cynical ones — before these inevitably become in turn repressive, also (because people hate disorder more than they love freedom) — each claiming meanwhile democratic legitimacy.

The goal, ideally, would be to achieve a society that is both liberal, in the sense of free, yet better protected from a misguided or fickle electorate by the adherence to the most socially desirable moral and ethical standards. It is evident to anyone who follows U.S. and European news that these standards are often the object of controversy and conflict, and the politics of post-Christian western society as it regards moral and ethical values is quite often divisive. It is the free exercise of democratic rights in the absence of any consensus of what should and should not be permitted that ineluctably leads to division, conflict and social fracture. If the success, then, of a democratic society is conditioned by the ethical and moral values of its citizenry, what should these values be; how will they be preserved and fostered; and how is a consensus on them to be achieved when even the idea of a universal ethical standard is no longer fully accepted?

While there may be some abstract, universal truth with regards to ethical issues and notions of things intrinsically right or wrong, this universal truth is inconsequential unless there is an accurate or, at least, agreed upon understanding of it. It is because there are so many differences of opinion over the understanding of any such truth that conflict arises. One way to diminish this conflict is to suppress the free expression of opinions as well as the establishment of any institutions that are contrary to the conventional wisdom or established dogma. This happens, of course, in communist and fascist regimes as well as Islamic republics... and France. Ironically and in an imperfect way, France, as well as other European countries, may point the way for democracies to survive both their democracy and their liberalism.

The New Moral Paradigm

There has evolved in Europe a new moral paradigm based mainly on secular, humanistic philosophy. This has been codified somewhat in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It can be seen as either an ambitious document or a pretentious one, the wording of which may be deliberately vague, but which has, nevertheless, the merit of trying to establish an ethical code that the signatory nations are to abide by, and which entitles to their citizens certain nebulous rights.

What is noteworthy in this wish-list is not that people have rights granted to them, somewhat like the American Bill of Rights, but that these rights are an entitlement simply by virtue of the fact that one is human. There is nothing wrong with this on first inspection, but one wonders.... what could have possibly inspired such an idea?! It is not as though this entitlement is acknowledged as a purely human endeavor, a contract of sorts between governments and their governed, but that these rights are actually intrinsic to the status of just being human, that people are in some mysterious way endowed with these rights. No sacred text is cited, no divine authority is invoked. These rights are simply "proclaimed" as such.

The remarkable point in all this is the degree of acceptance this document has enjoyed in Europe. This sets a precedent, of course. If one can have accepted out of thin air the idea that human beings are endowed with intrinsic rights, just like that, then one may do so with other ideas as well — ideas that touch upon notions of right and wrong, or duties and obligations.

The fact of Muslim "democracy" being constrained by Sharia Law, and that the moral and ethical principles of the Koran guide civil and constitutional law has had the effect of creating a fairly consensual, though somewhat repressive society. The citizens of those countries don't give the impression of minding the repressiveness all that much probably because they are used to it or because of the social stability this confers. The principle of marrying moral values and religious precepts to politics to ensure consensus and social stability may have merit, however, especially if the ethical standards actually prove to be socially beneficial, balancing the interests of society with those of the individual. Muslim "democracies" may be employing a good principle, then, but the wrong standards.

European countries are embarking somewhat down this same path. Freedom of speech, for example, if it isn't merely in name only, is far more restrictive in France, Germany, Austria and elsewhere in Europe than it is in Britain or the United States. Speech and publications that have the effect of creating even the impression of racial phobia, for example, are simply outlawed and censored. Austria recently arrested a British historian for something he wrote several years ago that called into question the Holocaust, something that is illegal in Austria and that he had, earlier, retracted. France has banned the wearing of distinctive religious garb and symbols in public schools and work places. It has also expelled Muslim Imams for condoning, allegedly according to the tenets of their religion, politically incorrect practices, primarily wife beating, and is also dealing with the issue of polygamy among its African, muslim immigrants. That country is finally being driven to assert the primacy of republicanism over the ethnic and cultural traditions of its immigrant populations. This same thing is happening in other European countries as well.

What seems to be shaping up in a piecemeal fashion is a democratic ethic that would only permit the expression of those points of view, or the establishment of those institutions that were not, themselves, antithetical to democratic principles while repressing those that were. This would constitute a sort of Dictatorship of Democracy, and would not be, in itself, such a bad thing. There are problems, of course, though these are not insurmountable, and these societies would enjoy one huge advantage: this "dictatorship" would be subject, itself, to the principles of democracy.

The New Commandments?

What this article hopes to suggest, then, for the sake of social cohesion, stability and consistency, all the while still preserving freedom, is the abandonment of the piecemeal approach, and the adoption of an intelligent, deliberate formulation of what a democracy is and is not, and specifying in principle what it will and will not tolerate. These principles may be amended, of course, under the same conditions as, let's say, the American Bill of Rights, making it like that document much less vulnerable to the pressures of special interests or intellectually fashionable movements. These principles may be "proclaimed" just like that, or attributed to a higher authority, depending on the religious or philosophical sensibilities of those concerned. It would serve as a complement to any document that specifies what is permitted to its citizens in the way of rights, specifying however, what is not permitted by way of obligations. So, while one would have the right to speak freely, for example, one would have the obligation to not yell "fire" in crowded theaters or chant "Death to Christians" in the streets. And more importantly, it would certainly impose the obligation to uphold the principles of democracy. Tolerance need not tolerate intolerance; "live and let live" need not let live those who would not, themselves, let live.

The outcome on each democratic society would take different forms, of course, depending on the religious and philosophical sensibilities of the respective citizenry. In Europe, where humanism is largely influential, this sensibility may lead to the adoption of ethical obligations based on humanistic values. In those countries where there is a large, Christian electorate, this ethical code would probably be more in line with Biblical moral concepts. As for Islamic societies — with the exceptions of Turkey, which is resolutely secular, and Algeria, where not too many years ago the president of that country rightly suspended legislative elections when polls showed an imminent victory by radical Islamic fundamentalists.... well, they're already doing it, but perhaps not as well as it could be done. Whatever the outcome, it would be necessary to work out a model by representative forces that would have, it is hoped, the effect of diminishing the conflict and divisiveness that liberal societies must inevitably suffer, reducing thereby the risk they face of devolving into either fragmented and disorderly societies on the one hand, or repressive, despotic ones on the other. Since the seeds of its own destruction are already planted in its very principles, liberal democracy is doomed, anyway. The sort of "realistic democracy" proposed here, essentially offering society safeguards against itself, may buy it enough time to find its footing should it ever lose it. It would grant some permanence to democracy such that it needn't be only a "fair-weather" sort of institution, thriving only when times are good, and would make it more resistant to the storms that must inevitably come.