There is always this fallacious belief: “It would not be the same here; hear such things are impossible.” Alas, all the evil of the 20th century is possible everywhere on earth.
– Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Americans are inclined to believe that democracy will solve any country’s problems. Democracy is fragile and if we are to continue to lead the world in our quality of government we need to understand why it is so fragile and what the greatest threats to it are, particularly here in this country.
Democracy has only worked well for long periods in those countries heavily influenced by English traditions of government and law. Universal suffrage has not been a feature of democracies until modern times and its dangers are becoming more obvious as the welfare state takes an ever larger share of modern democracies’ economies and snares ever greater numbers of people in a web of dependency.
Consider two democracies who have both universal suffrage and mandatory voting, Greece and Argentina. Both have had tortured political careers. Greece had to be rescued in the 2008 – 2009 financial crisis and Argentina would be one of the richest countries in the world with sound government. Democracies can only work if a majority of those who actually vote are voting from a perspective of enlightened self-interest rather than for “What’s in it for me at public expense”.
It is very important for educational institutions, particularly our graduate schools of government and service academies, to teach an understanding of the lust for power and of how so many countries have been ruined and so many wars have been fought because of a single man gaining absolute power in a country. They should give a thorough grounding in how American government works, in political principles, and in leadership in government. Their graduates need to know that some individuals are consumed with an insatiable desire for power and will do anything to get and keep it, and to study the history of how tyrants have succeeded in gaining control of their countries with disastrous results for their citizens and those of their neighbors.
Without outside help it is usually extraordinarily difficult for a popular uprising to dislodge a dictator because a dictator typically takes control with his own cohort and then puts people loyal to him in all the key positions of authority and especially those with the role of controlling the population (this is the way Stalin bested Trotsky in the struggle for power in the Soviet Union following Lenin’s death – he controlled the key personnel decisions). When the dictator is threatened these key players have a tremendous vested interest in the preservation of the government of which they are a part. They will fight to the death to maintain the power of a ruler on whom their own power depends because if they lose it in a revolutionary situation they may lose their own lives and will certainly lose their careers and prestigious positions in society.
In many Latin American countries (and elsewhere) the military has taken over when the political situation became too dysfunctional. However most of these military leaders have had no interest in relinquishing power to democratic processes. However in America we have a history of outstanding military leaders of admirable character. The service academies, while instilling in their students the importance of honoring the principal of civilian control of the military, might also teach the importance of reestablishing democracy should our government ever stumble into a dictatorship through the democratic process.
(Rod Dreher begins his book, Live Not By Lies, with the Solzhenitsyn quote)