(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
. . . . . . . . . .
2022: The Year Democracy Fought Back [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags']
Date: 2022-11-14
This was supposed to be a big scary year for autocrats. Instead, 2022 will be looked back on as the year the authoritarian attacks on democracy culminated. I use the term “culminated” deliberately. We haven’t won, there could still be setbacks for democracy, but it finally feels like democracy is on the offense. Here’s a list of democracy’s biggest victories of the year, why I’m optimistic we’ll see more, and then I’ll end with a preview of some big battles that are still coming that we need to be ready for.
Democracy’s biggest wins in 2022
Here is a list of authoritarian's biggest plans in 2022 that ended up pro-democracy wins.
Slava Ukraini
If I had to pick the most important news story of 2022, it would be Russia’s spectacular failure in Ukraine. Vladimir Putin, like most fascists, looked at the West’s multi-cultural democracies with contempt. He thought them weak(they let girls and openly “Teh Gays” in their militaries). He thought Ukrainians would run and hide in the face of an attack. He thought that Europe wouldn’t dare do anything to interrupt fossil fuel delivery from Russian. And he thought Biden and America too weak from dealing with his cyber trolling. None of this turned out to be true.
Ukrainians surprised him and much of the world by choosing to fight — and doing so in numbers no one(but Ukrainians) expected. Ukraine might be have been an imperfect democracy, but it was far superior to the Orwellian hell scape that Putin has brought to most of the Russian federation. They stood their ground and fought.
Biden and the United States withstood Russian propaganda. As the pro-autocratic wing of the Republican party defended Putin and tried to convince the rest of us to do nothing, Democrats, Independents, and even most Republicans, continue to support Biden’s efforts in Ukraine.
As frustrated as we might be, Europe did have several concerns about energy for their citizens over the winter. The leaders of those countries actually worked hard to find alternative, if more expensive, sources of energy. Even Germany, who was most dependent on Russian fuel is finding a way to cope for this winter. What is even better is that most EU nations are spending more time planning for green energy than they are looking for fossil fuel. That’s a win for the environment and keeping their independence from Russian energy permanent.
Brazil stays a Democracy
Jair Bolsonaro learned from Trump and Trump’s own advisors on how to become an autocrat. Another win, or a close election there could’ve spelled the end of Brazilian democracy. Thanks to a little planning ahead, his plans did not come to fruition.
First of all, fortunately, the people of Brazil rejected Bolsonaro. Second, the vote, while close, wasn’t close enough to create confusion on who won. Supporters of democracy around the world took note of what was happening and congratulated the winner early and made clear that the legitimate winner was the only person they recognized as the leader of Brazil. This last step was important. If world leaders had made “neutral” statements about “Brazil’s leaders are up to Brazil”, it would’ve been a signal that violence or a coup would be ignored by the world.
The final victory in Brazil was the Brazilian military declaring their unambiguous support for the constitution. This might seem like a funny thing to mention, but you have to understand that Brazil was run by a military from 1964 until 1985.
France avoids Hard-Right turn
After Brexit and rising fuel costs related to the war in Ukraine and general inflation, far-right politician Marine Le Pen was thought to have an opportunity to upend French politics. Especially after Trump, Brexit, and other surprise right-wing wins, her anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim politics could’ve won the day. Instead, Macron beat her easily 59-41. One of Europe’s largest countries roundly rejected far-right politics.
U.S. voters reject Trumpism
After Trump lost the 2020 election, the question on everyone’s mind was “Did voters reject Trumpism, or just Trump’s incompetency”. In other words, would voters go for Trumpism as long as it wasn’t Trump running? The 2022 midterms answered that question. Republican extremism was roundly rejected in a historic win for Democrats last week. Biden shrugged off concerns of domestic weakness so that he can keep working on spreading democracy on the world stage. Ukraine will keep getting U.S. support.
Many people have already wrote volumes on how important this election was. I won’t pile on. I just wanted to take a minute to frame its importance to the world and the global struggle for democracy of authoritarianism.
Future Victories for Democracy
Long term, I expect future victory for democracies. Here’s some trends to watch for positive signs.
Russia and Putin’s decline
Russia is exhausted itself in Ukraine. Russia wasn’t exactly an economic powerhouse even before the War. Russia’s economy was eclipsed by even Texas. And now with world wide sanctions its getting smaller. Russia’s workforce of young healthy men is currently being sent to Ukraine to die or be maimed. Even more have fled the country. This will have long-term consequences for Russian economy and influence.
The Russian military did still have some bite to it before the war. Thanks to its Soviet past, the Russian army had vast amounts of vehicles and munitions. Of course, we’re finding out that much of that wasn’t in working order, and those that were are now smoldering heaps in Ukraine.
In the beginning of 2022, the idea of Putin being deposed in Russia was absurd. Now? I wouldn’t bet on it, but there is at least an opening for either a possible coup or mass uprising(or some combination of both). In American politics its no longer a taboo to talk about a post-Putin Russian.
Autocratic China’s Long Term Decline
Unlike my Putin speculation, this is an outright prediction on my part: China’s influence on the world will decline. China’s influence has been mostly economic. The U.S. and Europe sold out democracy in exchange for cheap manufactured goods from China. China’s long term planning has been all about making it faster and easier to export goods across the globe known as their Belt and Road Initiative. China faces two insurmountable roadblocks now.
Their first roadblock is completely domestic and of their own making. Their population is getting smaller and older. As a population gets wealthier and more urban there is a tendency towards declining birth rates. But in addition to that, years of their harsh “1 child policy” has left them with an upside down population: Few young workers and many retirees. You cannot be an economic powerhouse if your worker numbers are declining while your “take care of” population is growing.
The second roadblock is that the World’s democracies are finally figuring out that moving all of its manufacturing to an autocratic nation is not only economically devastating to its working class citizens, but also a national security risk. As we leave the age of neoliberal politics expect the world’s democracies to stop talking about “bringing back manufacturing jobs” and to start actually doing it. COVID may have did in China’s status as the world’s manufacturer by waking up the rest of the country to the threat of lost manufacturing capacity.
Decline of “Oil”garchies
One of the strongest drivers of authoritarianism is countries that are rich in oil. I don’t have the space to explain the Resource Curse in its entirety(start with this video if you’ve never heard of it). But basically, having a valuable resource like gold or oil makes it easier for would-be dictators.
With the increase in Green and renewable energy, the value of oil is going to slowly go down. This has consequences. If dictators in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, or Russia are strong because they can become fabulously wealthy from oil sales, a decline in oil value becomes a threat to their power. Watch for this over the coming years as cars get electrified and the electric grid becomes less dependent on oil and gas.
Inflation will subside
Authoritarian parties thrive on denouncing democracies as weak and ineffectual. That’s why there are always rising cases of authoritarianism after a sever economic disturbance. It should be noted, however, that autocrats are universally bad for your health and your wealth.
Inflation will eventually subside. Combined with better employment, onshoring manufacturing, we should see a good economy in the medium term. That will help stop growing authoritarianism and create room for democracy to expand and show its strength.
Potential Problems
2022 hasn’t been all victory and there are some big fights ahead. We should be prepared to fight them.
Bad apples in Europe
Far-right parties still exist in Europe. Unfortunately, one of them has taken over in Italy. The good news is that Italian politics is notoriously fickle. They’ve had 77 governments over the last 70 years. So this government will likely not last long. In addition, the election that brought them to power was an extremely low turnout election(sound familiar?). Hopefully, that means it will be easier for the left, center-left, and center to overcome in the next election.
Speaking of bad apples in Europe, something needs to be done about Hungary and Viktor Orbán. Everyone agrees that this guy is a problem. Its going to require work to either throw him out of office, or throw Hungary out of NATO. I’m not supper optimistic about this problem. It is likely to persist for a long time.
India
The world’s largest democracy, and supposed counter-balance to China, is on the cusp of leaving democracy behind. One thing that could help is a declining threat of China. But restoring India’s imperfect democracy will be a long term issue going forward.
Turkey
Turkey was once a democracy and stood as a strong example for middle east politics. Unfortunately, it has fallen to autocratic forces. With a history of democracy we can hope these changes can be reversed, but I fear Turkey will be another long-term project.
U.S. and other Democracies Remain “On the Cusp”
While it finally feels like Authoritarianism is declining, we still must remain vigilant. If we give up it could come back here, Brazil, or in EU nations. Britain is a good example. Their conservative party is currently a mess. Labour may capitalize on their mess and come back strong. OR something even worse could get organized in Britain.
Worse still, would-be autocrats are cooperating on an international scale. Something we will have to continue watching to prevent them from gaining any further footholds.
Conclusion
We have a lot to celebrate this year. We also have a lot of work to do. I have a feeling we need at least one more election before putting Trumpism to bed permanently here at home. The struggle for democracy is global and interrelated. Victories and defeats for democracy affect the U.S. and vice versa. But for the first time since November of 2016 I feel more hope than dread for the future. Let’s keep fighting, we’re winning!
[END]
---
[1] Url:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/11/14/2134710/-2022-The-Year-Democracy-Fought-Back
Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.
via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/
