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Modern Conflict Favours Autocracies

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Photo by Mathias P.R. Reding on Unsplash

According to Freedom House, 2020 marked the 15th consecutive year of decline in global freedom. Russia continues to interfere with foreign politics and brashly intimidate Ukraine, China leveraged the COVID-19 pandemic to tighten control of its population, and Iran has indicated intentions to increase nuclear activities. Meanwhile, the United States (U.S.) has left a broken Afghanistan after twenty years, Great Britain is reeling from the consequences of Brexit, and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is struggling to maintain relevancy and address growing threats at its borders.

Amidst these changing politics and growing murmurs of great power competition is a shift in the nature of modern conflicts. Some experts argue that the conventional total wars of the 20th century will never occur again. Advances in artificial intelligence, space technologies, and cyber capabilities are digitising the battlefield and encouraging the adoption of unconventional and hybrid warfare. Modern conflict is extending beyond set-piece battles to encompass ever broader means of attaining political aims. Rapid advancements in technology mean that cyberattacks, disinformation campaigns, and proxy militias are replacing conventional troops while being leveraged more cheaply, effectively, and discreetly than ever before. This technology-driven battlefield favours autocracies as it blurs the line between combatants and civilians and confuses the traditional laws of war. Authoritarian regimes are better positioned for this 21st century conflict than democratic states for three key reasons – their suppression of domestic dissent, centralisation of government, and close relationships with industry.

First, a defining characteristic of autocracies is their elimination of opposition and control of information. Authoritarian regimes of the 20th century relied on extensive networks of informants and secret police – 1 in every 6 East Germans provided information to the Stasi after the Second World War. Today’s technology eliminates such cumbersome systems while simultaneously improving a state’s ability to surveil and control its population. Freedom House’s 15-year decline in democracy corresponds closely with the rise of the internet age, while research has found that today’s ‘digital autocracies’ are more durable than both their historic predecessors and their less technologically adept peers. Led by China, the use of digital tools enables autocracies in previously impossible ways. Massive amounts of data are generated on every citizen and used to control the population through social credit scores and arrest. Autocracies leverage technology by using deep fakes, disinformation, and internet outages to discredit political opponents, tamp down protests, or suppress unfavourable news coverage. And technological advancements only promise increasingly sophisticated ways for autocracies to monitor and manipulate their populations.

Digital autocracies are thus advantaged over democratic states in modern conflict because they effectively reduce public pressure on government actions. A 2020 RAND report found that the influence of public opinion restricted the options and tools available to democracies as compared to autocracies in conflicts. While democracies experience immense public pressure that often limits foreign policy decisions, authoritarian regimes enabled by technology face fewer constraints. Democratic leaders must spend nontrivial amounts of time and money during war to reduce civilian casualties, maintain public support, and win re-election. By contrast, authoritarian regimes are less accountable to their populations, making it easier for them to break international law without consequence, such as Russia’s enforced silence regarding soldiers killed in Ukraine. In suppressing domestic dissent more successfully than ever, autocracies are at an asymmetric advantage in modern conflict because of their flexibility of action unchecked by public opinion.

A second common, although not universal, attribute of autocracies is government centralisation. By concentrating power, authoritarian leaders ensure more control over their state’s budget, long-term planning, national security, legal infrastructure, popular culture, and foreign policy. The U.S. and China demonstrate the stark difference between decentralised and centralised government. The U.S. government quarrels annually over a budget and sometimes shuts down, whereas the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) articulates long-term plans spanning decades. Although the legitimacy of these long-term plans are contested, their mere existence demonstrates a governmental unity that democratic states like the U.S. will likely never achieve. Autocratic governments also tend to be more consolidated than democratic ones, with few independent bodies, limited organic growth, and highly integrated systems. China even has surveillance mechanisms in place to ensure CCP employees are dedicated to the party’s vision and motivated to perform.

Such centralisation can be advantageous to authoritarian states in modern conflict, particularly with the rise of hybrid and unconventional warfare. The commonly espoused antidote for Western democracies in the face of hybrid warfare is a ‘whole of government’ response. Because hybrid warfare is so diffuse, targeting everything from power grids to congressional emails, an enormous number of entities outside of the military may be involved. Democracies often scramble to unite disparate entities for a cohesive defence and response to unconventional warfare, such as the U.S. during the recent SolarWinds hack. Conversely, centralised autocracies are inherently well-positioned because they enact ‘whole of government’ responses to conflict by default. Moreover, centralised autocracies may have fewer cyber and human vulnerabilities to exploit. Aggressive control of communications infrastructure and security practices, such as the CCP’s monitoring of all internet traffic, can improve cybersecurity nationwide. Centralised autocracies use methods to control employees and citizens’ loyalty and technology usage, further limiting susceptibilities to information operations and social engineering. Government centralisation thus benefits autocracies in modern conflict by reducing vulnerabilities and structurally ensuring holistic responses to threats.

Finally, autocracies tend to be much more closely integrated with national industry than democracies. China and Russia typify two differing ways these relationships manifest. China’s president Xi Jinping has taken steps to integrate the CCP into all private companies, pushing for CCP board appointees, eliminating powerful or disloyal business leaders, and coercing foreign companies to support the CCP’s ‘United Front’. Furthermore, China’s 2017 national intelligence law requires organisations within China to ‘support, assist, and cooperate with the state intelligence work’. This law effectively mandates all businesses operating in China to provide any or all of their information and services to the government if asked. While the law technically only applies to intelligence, it is an easy stepping stone to more malign uses – and Chinese companies touch everything from Apple to General Electric, from Hollywood to Wall Street. As China has aggressively legislated its control over industry, Russia has embraced opportunities of partnership. Russia is increasingly using private military companies as proxy militias while encouraging or hiring civilians to undertake cyberattacks and information operations. Usage of civilians in these roles provides Russia with plausible deniability and increased capability. It also complicates any response from NATO and the West because of the complexities of international law and combatant designations.

Despite differences in approach, Russia and China’s leverage of national industry in a way unique to autocracies advantages them in modern conflict. Democracies, built on ideas of freedom of expression and freedom of action, cannot force industry to partner with defence.

Burgeoning technology companies, the quickening pace of research, and the evolving role of dual-use technology are forcing western defence departments to rely more heavily on private innovation. Budgetary constraints and public resistance, such as with Project Maven, are antagonising Western democracies’ defence contracts even as peer autocracies forge ahead with industry relationships unfettered by morals or law. Such easy relationships with industry cheapen and quicken defence acquisitions for autocracies. Conversely, democracies are obligated to pursue contracts within a framework heavily restricted by democratic principles, public opinion, and law. Autocracies are thus vastly advantaged in modern conflict by relationships with industry that democracies cannot match.

Rapid technological development is shaping the 21st century, changing the nature of warfare, and cementing the power of autocracies. Modern conflict, defined by hybrid and unconventional warfare, favours some of the unique characteristics of autocracies – suppression of domestic dissent, government centralisation, and close relationships with industry. Autocracies are of course not infallible though, and democracies are not doomed. Democracies are advantaged with a creativity, diversity, and passion rarely found within authoritarian regimes. While quashing of dissent and extreme centralisation can be beneficial, it is also dangerous. There are few mechanisms in place to guide autocratic leaders away from missteps – any one of which may be disastrous given the often deeply integrated nature of the government. And even as technology enables better surveillance, it enables better evasion, too. Populations under repressive rule are rarely silent, and an autocracy’s power is fragile. Western democracies would be prudent to consider the chinks in autocracies’ armour, even as they reckon with the large chinks in their own. Modern conflict favours autocracies, and the democratic West must prepare to face this new reality.

Disclaimer: The opinions and assertions contained herein are the private opinions of the author and are not to be construed as official or reflecting the views of the United States Department of Defense or the United States Air Force.

Has Myanmar’s military overplayed its hand?

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An example of military propaganda. The Tatmadaw has long portrayed itself as the sole protector of Myanmar’s interests. Photo Credit: Immu, Licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

On 27th March, Myanmar’s powerful military (commonly known as the Tatmadaw), killed over 100 civilians protesting its 1st February overthrow of Aung San Suu Kyi’s democratically elected government. The Tatmadaw has reacted forcefully against demonstrators since the start of the protests, and this was not the first time it had killed civilians. However, the crackdown was unprecedented in its brutality. Despite the bloodshed, protestors defied the military by returning to the streets the very next day, and over a month later the protests show no sign of fading away.

The foundations of the chaos in Burma run deep. During colonial rule, the British governed the minority dominated periphery regions as self-governing frontier areas, separate from Burma proper. This divide and rule strategy saw ethnic minorities heavily recruited into the colonial army while the Bamar majority was excluded. The legacy of ethnic division was compounded by the founding of the modern Burmese state, which was largely built around the Bamar dominated army of the Burmese nationalists. The Rohingya crisis of 2015, which saw Suu Kyi, the symbol of Myanmar’s democracy, taking a nationalist line in defence of the Tatmadaw’s campaign of ethnic cleansing, emphasises just how deep ethnic divisions lie in Myanmar. Successive military regimes have exploited this ethnic dimension to remain in power, casting themselves as the defenders of the Bamar majority and promoting ethnic nationalism. Following decades of military rule, the military generals came to see themselves as the only ones who knew what was good for the country. However, the question remains, what prompted the Tatmadaw to seize power this time, and given the widespread public opposition to the coup, has it overplayed its hand?

Why did Myanmar’s military believe a coup was necessary?

The military has denied it carried out a coup and has instead claimed that it acted in defence of democracy, citing fraud and discrepancies in the 2020 general election, although the extent to which it genuinely believes this is debateable. Consequently, there are other theories as to why the Tatmadaw seized power. Its support for the democratic transition has always been contingent upon its ability to retain a high degree of influence in the country’s political system, Myanmar’s constitution reserves 25% of seats in parliament for the military and has a threshold of 75% for any constitutional changes. However, the landslide 2020 election result for Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy was seen as providing a mandate for constitutional reform and increased the pressure on the military not to stand in the way. It is no coincidence that the coup occurred the day the new parliament was due to be sworn in. It has also been suggested that powerful military chief General Min Aung Hlaing was acting to protect his personal interests. The General was due to retire in 2021 and, faced with the potential threat of international prosecution for genocide against the Rohingya, may well have acted to extend his immunity.

Why has the coup faced such resistance?

Myanmar has changed since being put on the path back to civilian rule. Reform has been slow, but Myanmar’s large young population has experienced greater personal freedoms and better access to education, information, and the rest of the world. After experiencing these freedoms, this new generation has little desire to live under the restrictive military rule of previous decades. This attitude can be seen in the prominence of the three-finger salute in images of the protests. The symbolic gesture has been widely used by young activists across South East Asia as a sign of defiance against authoritarianism. Believing it can reimpose military rule as if nothing has changed represents a significant gamble by the Tatmadaw. It is an even greater gamble to do so having just removed a popular democratic government. Aung San Suu Kyi holds a revered status in Myanmar, and further endeared herself to the people by risking her international reputation to defend Myanmar (and by extension the Tatmadaw) against accusations of genocide at the International Court of Justice. This despite her previous long imprisonment at their hands. Suu Kyi’s landslide election victory not only demonstrated her and the NLD’s enduring popularity amongst the people, but also highlighted Myanmar’s growing rejection of the Tatmadaw. The military’s proxy party won only 33 of 476 seats. Even those activists who turned away from the NLD as a result of their inaction over the Rohingya crisis have proven willing to stand alongside them in opposition to the coup.

What does this mean for Myanmar?

In the short term, the Tatmadaw is under increasing pressure from both inside and out. The regime’s initial support from Russia and China, who blocked condemnation of the coup at the UN, has waned as the crackdown has grown increasingly bloody. On 10th March both countries backed a unanimous statement from the UN Security Council denouncing the Tatmadaw’s violent response to protests. ASEAN, the regional group of Myanmar’s neighbours, is divided over the issue. However, Malaysia and Indonesia have been heavily critical, and the group has pressed Min Aung Hlaing to commit to an end to the violence. With the regime increasingly isolated internationally, Western powers have been ratcheting up the pressure. In the days before the recent crackdown, the US and UK imposed economic sanctions on Myanmar’s two vast military conglomerates. These sanctions will hurt, but it is domestically where the military faces a greater reckoning. The coup and the brutal crackdown that followed has tarnished the Tatmadaw’s image. If anger towards the military continues to rise then a growing number of people in Myanmar may begin to aspire to a future without it. Nevertheless, the Tatmadaw is unlikely to change course. For all the pressure it faces, the military has shown itself ready to use force to put down protests, and likely knows that China, although displeased, will not go as far as to abandon it internationally. Therefore, there is a good chance the military can ride out the protests and succeed in its initial objectives. Min Aung Hlaing could delay his retirement and the Tatmadaw avoid the prospect of major constitutional reform which curtails its power.

However, the generals do not appear to have considered the long-term consequences of their actions. For one, by gambling on a coup to improve its position the military has thrown away a political situation which remained immensely favourable to it, and once it reaches its self-imposed deadline for new elections in 2022, it is difficult to envisage a scenario in which it benefits. If it holds a free election, it will almost certainly lose, and face an NLD or unity government which will be empowered and unlikely to compromise following the events of the coup. On the other hand, if it attempts to retain power, it will erode what little respect and legitimacy it has left.

More significantly, by choosing to overthrow Suu Kyi’s popular and increasingly nationalistic government, the Tatmadaw has set itself at odds with its core constituency, Myanmar’s Bamar majority. For an institution which derives a large degree of legitimacy from its role as the protector of the Bamar ethnicity, the brutal suppression of the predominantly Bamar protestors makes such a mantra ring increasingly hollow. The chaos of the protests and widespread disaffection with the military unleashed by the coup has also emboldened and reenergised the country’s various ethnic militias, several of whom have stepped up their offensives, with increasing success. This is not the only way in which the Tatmadaw’s grip on power has been weakened by the effects of the coup. The military takeover and accompanying crackdown have revealed to many Bamar the true extent of the Tatmadaw’s brutality, which has had the effect of facilitating a growing understanding of the plight faced by Myanmar’s minorities. The consequence has been tentative cooperation between the Bamar dominated anti-coup movement and several of the ethnic groups fighting the military. Any reconciliation, even if limited for now, will serve to diminish the Tatmadaw’s ability to divide and rule.

In short, the February coup may well have preserved the Tatmadaw’s immediate political interests, but it has also had several major consequences for the military’s long-term prospects of retaining its entrenched position within Myanmar’s state and society. In fact, by prioritising short-term gain over long-term strategy, the coup has significantly undermined several of the key aspects which make up the Tatmadaw’s claim to legitimacy, and as a result could end up costing it far more than it stood to lose in the first place.

Feature - Ending the ‘End of History’: Revisiting Western Interventionism in Fragile States

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by Anna Tan

Young boys among the rubble of the ongoing war in Libya (Image credit: OCHA/Giles Clarke)

The post-Cold War notion of liberal democracy’s ultimate victory, demonstrated by the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, ought to be jettisoned. Francis Fukuyama famously described this perception as the ‘the triumph of the West, [demonstrating the] total exhaustion of viable systematic alternatives to Western liberalism’. Scholarly circles since long discarded this end of history thesis, which proposes a romantic vision of the post-Cold War world order. Fukuyama himself would later lament the over-optimism of his theory, which to many announced the end of ideological conflict. Far from mundane, the present nature of international relations should put an end to the mistaken, yet enduring perception of democracy versus authoritarianism. With the US bogged down in endless wars, as well as the Anglo-Saxon loss of influence in international institutions suggest a comfortable that begets confronting. With the liberal West far from winning, the question can be asked: does the promotion of democracy always lead to peace?

If the liberal system of alliances and diplomacy is to be reinvigorated, lessons from the past decades of interventionism urgently require acknowledging. Policymakers, however, seem keen on perpetuating the end of history in their approaches towards fragile states and repressive regimes. This normative belief in authoritarianism’s ultimate decay and democracy’s eventual victory stands in stark contrast with the world of 2020. A global pandemic, which, in turn, is spurring on the biggest economic free-fall since the Great Depression is but one of the headaches. A willingly contracting American diplomacy and the rise of nationalist forces across the globe, two others. It seems clear: the coherence of the liberal democratic alliance is tearing at its seams.

Indeed, the endurance of Fukuyama’s thesis is not to be underestimated in the modern history of US diplomacy and its alliances in the West. However, already at the turn of the century, important lessons became available on the state of the world and liberal democracy’s role therein. The ramifications of the Iraq War on international peace and security, it can be argued, are reverberating to this day. The successful overthrow of Saddam Hussein, combined with the failure to end tyranny in the country stands in stark contrast with earlier, presumably success stories including the collapse of South Africa’s Apartheid regime in the 1990s, Tunisia during the 2011 Arab Springs, and Myanmar’s rather short-lived détente with the Anglosphere in 2012.

The David-and-Goliath kind of euphoria and spectacle that tends to ensue with civil resistance against regime change, nevertheless, does not lead policymakers to reassert their prior assumptions about the nature of such conflicts. Instead, the US-led interventionism of the liberal West is strengthened by the belief in democracy’s impending win. Violence, then, becomes an unfortunate yet unavoidable means to this end. Even fewer questions are asked about the underlying contexts of liberal democracy’s failure in the aftermath of the Arab Springs and in Myanmar’s stalled transition towards democracy. Instead, countries imploded in a wave of mass atrocities and civil strife.

In the case of Myanmar, the ‘end of history’ thesis continues to emanate strongly in the universal embrace of diplomatic ostracism towards the country (and to the figure of Aung San Suu Kyi herself) as a means to heal its complex problems, not just within bilateral diplomatic circles and multilateral institutions, but also within the global advocacy groups. Indeed, democratisation continues to be perceived as a panacea for all kinds of a state’s ailments. Mike Rann, former Premier of Southern Australia, poignantly reflected on this situation as follows:

In retrospect the West’s view [on Myanmar] was as naïve as its view that the so-called Arab Spring and toppling tyrants like Gaddafi in Libya would see the spontaneous emergence of democracy, embrace of human rights and the independent rule of law. Instead, in Libya, we saw the re-emergence of tribalism and militias and civil war.

Such a conclusion is echoed by Pauline Baker, former President Emeritus of The Fund for Peace, who similarly argued against the ‘end of history’ for the implementation of free and fair elections tends to bypass larger complexities in state-building. Indeed, the rather infelicitous outcomes entailing short-lived democratisation processes in the Middle East as well as across several African states overlooks the entrenched lack of historical experience in human rights and democratic governance in societies that are of concern. It overlooks legitimacy gaps, the marginalisation of old elites, ethnoreligious compositions, and grievances associated with identities thereof. Baker contends:

In truth, the biggest danger facing fragile states in transition is not the rise of new dictatorship, as is often assumed… but the larger threats are civil war, state collapse, mass atrocities, humanitarian emergencies, and a possible break-up of the country.

Baker’s concerns were a premonition to contemporary Myanmar. In the present day, the country saw worsened peripheral civil wars that had been raging since its independence from the British in 1947 but have also checked more boxes of the tribulations as described in Baker’s proposition. In Myanmar, democratisation was at siege concurrently. Miracle cases of democracy such as Botswana offer but little insight into the enduring failure of the ideology to spread in other parts of the world, particularly where state institutions are fragile. Moreover, Botswana remains an electoral, procedural democracy (on the basis of democratic processes and legitimacy) propped up by the country’s elite, rather than a substantial one (which would be more inclusive and allow plurality). The case of Myanmar is again illustrative: while it underwent a certain degree of democratisation, to call it a procedural one to such state would be an overstatement.

Usefully, Pauline Baker stresses the importance of institutional building in fragile states and the need for inclusive approaches towards democratisation in those states. Baker holds that: ‘if former war-lords and powerbrokers want to move from the battlefield to the ballot box, they should be allowed to do so, provided they give up their arms and refrain from keeping private armies in reserve in case they lose elections.’ The emergence of newfound fundamental freedoms means at least some level of stability that had been formerly achieved by the state through its monopoly of coercive force, yet also leaving a vacuum of state power at the same time. Without significant peacebuilding in place to replace that gap, which should involve disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (DDR) of combatants; it should be clear that democratisation during an entrenched armed conflict often further weakens already fragile states and pushes them closer towards state failure. As such, Baker argues, ‘although it may not be possible in all cases, [DDR] of armed militias should precede voting. Otherwise, the losing side, which has access to arms and fighters, can return to fighting if it does not like the electoral outcome.’

This stability vacuum is defined by scholars such as Charles T. Call as the “security gap.” Call here diverges from scholars at the Fund for Peace, contending that the universal conceptualisation of fragile states (as visible in the creation of Fragile States Index) perceives of institutional capacity-building as an oversimplified remedy to the troubles faced by such states. He purports that the traditional neoconservative but also neoliberal wings of US interventionism similarly overlook legitimacy gaps between new and old state actors and capacity gaps in state institutions. In Myanmar’s case for instance, what we ultimately missed is the contrast between the historical, cultural, and religious legitimacy of Aung San Suu Kyi and that of the former military junta which is widely considered by the population as illegitimate. This means that imposing international norms of democratic governance and human rights becomes much less effective as Western actors lack significant domestic public support for their policies.

This capacity gap is so visible, in fact, that Myanmar seems to show an increased state fragility than prior to democratisation. Civil war has become intractable than before as political liberation without proper state institutions in place. Capacity building, or state-building for that matter, is not a catch-all term for these problems, which are highly contextual. Call also rejects ostracism, the isolating reflex in human rights diplomacy, arguing that ‘the prescription to step away and withdraw from international engagement is just as likely to benefit these victimizers (usually repressive state actors) rather than their victims or their political opponents.’ In the case of mass atrocities, lack of historical diplomatic investment in principled engagement and coordination can result in foreign actors lacking sufficient political leverage in addressing early warning signs and ultimately granting repressive regimes the opportunity to draw away from observing international norms and human rights principles.

What Call’s argument misses, however, is that in the case of war-torn states and mass atrocities, the picture is not always as clear cut between civilian victims and state victimisers. Myanmar’s many insurgent groups are identity-based groupings whose activities also cost many lives of the very civilians they claim to represent. The more heterogeneous the population, the more convoluted the nature of conflict and prospects for peacebuilding.

Without understanding the context, the complexities of various civil conflicts will decide the viability of bringing peace and security by outsiders. Democratisation alone, thus, is not a cure to counteract state failure nor a harbinger of justice and prosperity for such countries. As such, the ultimate challenge for governments keen on promoting liberal democracy requires these complexities to be realistically assessed and feasibly taken into account during the crafting of foreign policy towards fragile states. Failing to do so risks throwing already fragile states down the cliff. Such results could further disrupt the liberal world order many strive to uphold. Rather than the end of history thesis, conventional diplomacy will benefit from greater creativity and innovation in its communications. We should find new ways to relay to repressive, fragile states, that international norms are in their interests and not a threat.

This article has been kindly reviewed by Professor Pauline Baker, former President Emeritus of Fund for Peace (1996-2010). It also builds on the author’s personal interview with HE Mike Rann, AC CNZM, Former Premier of Southern Australia (2002-2011) and former Australian Ambassador to Italy, Albania, Libya, and San Marino (2014-2016) held in London, 15 August 2020.

Anna Tan is a Programme Ambassador for the MSc Global Affairs, due to graduate with an overall First Class Honours (Distinction) from King’s College London. Her research is based at the Department of War Studies, focusing on Western human rights diplomacy vis-à-vis fragile and failing states. Anna has formerly worked for the American Red Cross, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and The Policy Institute. She is also on the Programme Committee of the Conflict, Security and Development (CSD) Conference 2020. Her work has been featured in King’s College London’s School of Security Studies and elsewhere on Strife. Anna is a recipient of the Oxford University Press (OUP) award for 2019 upon graduation from her BSc in Neuroscience as Top 3 of the Faculty from the University of Leicester.

Strife Feature - Nationalism and Lessons from Russia

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By Christopher Morton

In 2008 Russia invaded South Ossetia and in 2014 Russia invaded Crimea - both secessionist provinces of Georgia and Ukraine respectively. On the one hand, these interventions can be viewed as a justified defense of the rights of minority populations in these provinces. On the other hand, both interventions were deemed to be disproportionate acts of aggression towards sovereign states, in contravention of international law, reflecting a policy shift from cooperation with the international community to unilateral action in defiance of it. In this post, I shall consider the understandings that lay behind these actions: in particular, Russia’s shift from imitation of Western norms during the nineties, to increasingly strong opposition to these norms. Fanning this hostility towards the West was a nationalist consensus which was rehabilitated and consolidated under Putin, enhanced by NATO expansion which was deemed unacceptable by the Kremlin. Indeed, the events of 2008 and 2014 in part represented the failures of the West to make collective agreements, particularly on security, which could have allowed co-operation between Russia and the West rather than distrust to become the norm.[1] In the final part of this post, I shall consider some lessons that Britain can take from the development of nationalism in Russia as a stronger nationalist consensus emerges and the notion of British identity is reconstructed post-Brexit.

Levan Gabechava/Reuters/Landov. A column of Russian troops prepares to leave the checkpoint at a bridge over the Inguri River in Western Georgia, in October 2008, after securing the secession of Georgia’s breakaway South Ossetia region. Russia went to war in Georgia over the breakaway province of South Ossetia in a move justified by an increasingly nationalist tone from the Kremlin.

Since his election in 1998, Putin has been able to build a political consensus around a single idea of the Russian nation by emphasising the notion of Russia’s messianic purpose[2] and rehabilitating the myths and symbolism of former glories.[3] By placing the idea of Russia as a great power at the centre of his politics, Putin at once appeased hardline nationalists and co-opted those disenchanted by the failures of the nineties and searching for a grander narrative in which to root their identity. In this way, Putin won the support of the very people whose liberty he would curtail in pursuit of soglasie (stability) and a more managed form of democracy. This same rhetoric was also used to alienate opponents. With Russia now portrayed as defending traditional values against the West, opponents were criticised not only as being against Putin, but as being against Russia itself.

In 2005 Putin was still talking about Russia as “above all, a major European power”, progressing “together with European nations” and in 2006 he stressed the importance of relations with the United States and a willingness “to take new steps to expand the areas and framework of our cooperation”[4]. However, such comments seemed increasingly insincere. In 2006, Dimitri Trenin offered a typical assessment of Russia’s attitude towards America and its Western allies. Essentially, Trenin argued that Russia had stopped caring about how the West perceived its actions. This was confirmed, for example, by Russian cooperation with Iran in opposition to Western sanctions against its uranium enrichment.[5] Putin’s apathy towards Western judgment culminated in the invasion of South Ossetia and has become markedly more hostile since. In 2013, Putin described Western norms as “infertile and genderless” and as overseeing “a destruction of values from above”.[6] Similarly, in a speech after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Putin lambasted the West for their part in inciting and supporting first the Orange revolution of 2004 and then the Maidan protests which led to the overthrow of Ukraine’s Russian-leaning president Viktor Yanukovich.[7] If Russia of the nineties was content to show deference to the West, Russia’s aggressive foreign policy from 2008 confirmed what Putin’s rhetoric suggested: that Russia now identified itself as a leader of the opposition to the U.S-led unipolar world order.

The end of the end of history

It is easily forgotten that in the nineties, Fukuyama’s argument that a convergence towards Western norms was inevitable encapsulated the prevailing mood.[8] After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Boris Yeltsin, had been sympathetic to the so-called Western idea of liberal democracy. However, subservience to the Western model did not do the good that many had hoped. The economic plan implemented by Russia’s “young reformers” under the guiding hand of Western, neoliberal text books and the IMF, had catastrophic consequences for the lives of normal Russians, with poverty increasing from 2% in 1991 to over 40% of the population by 1998. Furthermore, the “privatisation at any costs” attitude of the Western capitalists and their Russian protégés allowed a business elite, now known as the “oligarchs”, to effectively steal national assets. Through the rigged “loans for shares” scheme, the Oligarchs were able to elevate themselves into the stratosphere of extreme wealth, while all around them, normal Russians struggled.

In the nineties, “shock therapy” privatisation led to wealth being concentrated amongst a group now known as the Oligarchs. President Boris Yeltsin has a meeting with CIS Executive Secretary Boris Berezovsky in the Kremlin. c:Getty Images

All this created a vacuum in which a new sense of Russian identity could be created. Russians had been told that they were no longer allowed to feel pride in the once great Soviet Union. Nor could Russia find any pride in the adoption of a Western model which seemed to have left their country’s interests side-lined as the oligarchs increased their control over an emasculated state. It was into this vacuum that Vladimir Putin stepped as a relatively unknown figure and Yeltsin’s chosen one. Putin saw an opportunity to give the Russian people something to believe in: a proud Russia with a privileged role in international politics; a Russia that would not accept Western hegemony; a Russia that would reclaim its role as a great power by setting out its own vision for the world, rather than passively accepting the religion of the “end of history”. This is what Alfred Evans called Russia’s “strategy for identity management of social creativity”, as opposed to the strategy of “social mobility” which had been pursued under Yeltsin, whereby the norms of nations perceived as having a higher “social status” were adopted, with the aspiration of joining that group.[9]

May’s Britain

We have much to learn from the gradual embrace of nationalism in Russia. Of course, Theresa May is not Putin and Britain is not Russia, the notion that Britain is slipping slowly into a nationalist mentality is unmistakable - the perils of which are illuminated by the Russian experience. As in Russia, the failings of a system which puts the ideology of profit and privatisation before people has left many disenchanted, alienated in their communities and struggling for something meaningful in which to root their identity. As with Russia, British history, whilst not short of glory, cannot be separated from the legacy of colonial oppression, not to mention more recent catastrophic escapades in the Middle East. However, there is a sense of loss at Britain not being able to wield the influence it once did. Finally, Brexit suggests that Britain, like Russia, is rehabilitating a sense of its own historic purpose independent from international hegemony. In place of building a collective identity with its European neighbours and embracing the notion of a deeper union, Britain has chosen to emphasise its own distinct identity, to which pooling of sovereignty is seen as a threat.

Theresa May has adopted an increasingly nationalist tone and has revelled in the perception of her being a difficult opponent for the EU

Even before a snap election was called, Theresa May had sought not to stimulate debate but to shut it down. In one incident, she accused Caroline Lucas “and some Labour MPs” of being “the first to defend our country’s enemies”. Such divisive nationalist rhetoric is not so far removed from Putin’s reference to opponents as “a disparate bunch of traitors”. Theresa May, the Conservative strategists and the right-wing press are now continuing along this line, repeating ad infinitum that Jeremy Corbyn hates Britain and that he sympathises with terrorists. This discourse creates a stark division between those who considered patriots and those more prone to critique the role played by Britain within the international community. In Brexit negotiations, Theresa May revels in her depiction as a “bloody difficult woman”, appealing to the notion of the EU as a threat, or at least an opponent. Just as Putin gains popularity from depicting Russia’s resistance to the West, so too is Theresa May emphasising her resistance of the EU rather than the need to maintain a sense of collective identity and shared interests, even post-Brexit. The result of this strategy is implicit in Angela Merkel’s recent declaration that Britain, along with the U.S, can no longer be relied upon as partners of the EU.

Like the Russians, British people have good reason to be searching for something meaningful in which to root their identity. In a bid to appease the UK Independence Part (UKIP) wing of her party and mobilise those communities left behind by globalisation, the Conservatives under Theresa May have intensified their use of chauvinistic, nationalist rhetoric, whereby anybody who valorises Britain’s national legacy and makes a sharp distinction between “us” and the unworthy “other” is part of the patriotic in-crowd. However, in constructing a new national identity post-Brexit, there are false dichotomies which need to be fervently resisted. Firstly, the populist dichotomy between “patriots” who love their country and traitors who are quick to condemn it: it is possible to be critical of one’s country, its policies and its history without hating it or “supporting its enemies”. Indeed, critique is a necessary engine of progress. A second dichotomy, as described by Alfred Evans, is between the opposing strategies of “social creativity” and “social mobility”: of course we want to be bold and “creative” in the actions we choose, standing up for our beliefs and, where possible, taking the lead on matters of international importance. However, we also want to be socially mobile, joining groups which share our interests and our values and strengthening the links that facilitate a convergence of understandings and the formation of collective identities that transcend borders.

As MP Jo Cox put it before her brutal murder at the hands of a neo-Nazi extremist, “we have more in common than that which divides us”. By entering into relationships of cooperation and collective responsibility, rather than seeking to impose our will upon others, this is a truth that can be internalised. This is a model which the EU, with all of its flaws and imperfections, represents through its motto: “United in Diversity”. As the UK leaves the EU, it is all the more pressing that we remember the value of this aspiration, rather than collapsing into egoistic and suspicious nationalism. The breakdown of shared understandings and collective responsibility between Russia and the West serves as a warning as to the dangers that lie ahead for Britain as jingoistic nationalism in political discourse becomes normalised.

Christopher is pursuing his MA in International Relations at King’s College London. Previously, he studied French and Philosophy at the University of Nottingham before working as a teacher in Paris and London.

Notes:

[1] Sauer: 88-89; Mearshimer: 79

[2] Kolst/Blakkisrud: p.277

[3] Laruelle: p.24

[4] Putin, 2005/2006

[5] Trenin: p.3

[6] Putin: 2013

[7] Putin: 2014

[8] 1989: 1

[9] Evans: 401

Bibliography

Trenin, Dimitri; Russia Leaves the West (2006)
http://www.risingpowersinitiative.org/wp-content/uploads/trenin4.pdf

Evans, Alfred; Ideological Change Under Vladimir Putin in the Perspective of Social Identity Theory (2015)

Fukuyama, Francis; The End of History? (1989)

Kolsto, Pal and Blakkisrud Helge (2005), Nation Building and Common Values in Russia

Mearsheimer, J. (2014), Why the Ukranian Crisis is the West’s Fault: the Liberal Delusions that Provoked Putin

Vladimir Putin Addresses of the Russian Federation (on Crimea), March 18 2014 http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/20603

Vladimir Putin’s Presidential address December 12, 2013
http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/19825

Sauer, T. (2017), The Origins of the Ukraine Crisis and the need for collective security between Russia and the West

Feature image credit: Wikimedia Commons

Strife Feature - Can We Trust Ourselves? The Evanescence and Revival of Democracy

by

By Ashley Pratt

British Prime Minister David Cameron (L) poses for a photograph after addressing pro-EU “Vote Remain” supporters at rally in Bristol, Britain June 22, 2016. REUTERS/Geoff Caddick/Pool

Over the past year, various political events have raised questions about the Western emphasis and reliance on democracy and democratic values. Despite predictions made by newspapers and pollsters, the world watched the United Kingdom voting to leave the European Union. In the months after the referendum, ‘the will of the people’ was invoked more than once to argue for staying the course on Brexit. There were also those who asked whether the people had in fact willed incorrectly, or whether it was the responsibility of the elected representatives of the people to make course corrections when democracy resulted in potentially catastrophic decisions.

Across the Atlantic, Americans were watching the rise of a failed businessman-turned-reality television star who first joined the Republican presidential primary, then won it against all expectations; then ran a campaign filled with dog-whistle racism and encouragement of (and alleged commission of) sexual assault. None of this stopped him, though, from winning the national election and becoming the 45th President of the United States of America. The general understanding is that the will of the American people elects the President, but in the world’s foremost democracy, the candidate with the largest proportion of the vote did not place her hand on the Bible on Inauguration Day. Many Brits watched in horror, appalled that the same forces that persuaded their fellow citizens to vote to leave the EU were at work in the victory of a right-wing populist candidate in the U.S. election.

In the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte ran for the presidency of his country in an election held in May. He was democratically elected to the position on the platform of cleaning up the Philippines’ drug problem, among other promises. Rival candidates claimed he would be little more than an executioner. In the intervening months, he has admitted to killing people with his own hands. However, he is the democratically elected executive, chosen by the people, among them those in whose deaths he possibly participates or at least orders. Just days ago, a referendum in Turkey gave Erdogan extensive new presidential powers. What do these results and others like them mean for the global political community’s reliance on democracy?

This article will examine both longstanding and more modern critiques of democracy and ask: What are we to make of the democratic foundations of modern political society? Are they strong enough to hold all of the weight we expect them to carry? There is, in the liberal democratic Western discourse, a notion that democracy will course-correct itself. All too often, though, commentary overlooks the fact that democracy is not tamper-proof. Can democracy as a means in and of itself ensure consistent societal improvement and progress towards societal equality? We are accustomed to believing that, as Martin Luther King Jr. offered, “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” However, since the quote made its way into the vernacular, many have argued that we must bend it. Does democracy rely on the natural moral arc of the universe, or is democracy the act of bending?

The roots of modern democracy can be traced back to the Enlightenment when the old became new again and much was made of the Greeks and Romans. When the lauded intellectual and philosophical father of the modern age Immanuel Kant set out to describe his imagined world consumed by “perpetual peace,” it was not to democracies he turned, but to republics.[1] He distrusted democracies. Kant’s republic was founded on three principles: freedom for all men, one common unified law for all subjects, and “the principle of legal equality for everyone.”[2] Such a vision neither looks nor sounds very different from the same principles on which the United States of America was founded. Kant took issue with what he refers to as the “despotism” inherent within democracies, “because it establishes an executive power through which all the citizens may make decisions about (and indeed against) the single individual without his consent.”[3] To Kant, the contradiction of “one and the same person…at the same time [being] both the legislator and the executor of his own will” was no more apparent than the similar contradiction at the heart of a democracy. Kant would rather suffer under the despotism of an individual than the despotism of the masses.[4]

Pressing forward chronologically, a new question arises. Is a presumption of democracy as the teleological end for systems of government simply another mechanism for neocolonial enforcement of western ideals? The Enlightenment had very little faith in women, people of color, or even the common man. Modern democracy could be the fruit of a poisoned tree. Throughout modern political philosophy, there is a through-line that democracies – especially liberal democracies - are inherently better than any other form of government. Rawls advocated a realistic utopia of liberal democracies that were on good terms with just but hierarchical (nondemocratic) societies and allied with them against unjust hierarchical societies. However, he had some arbitrary ideas on how human rights are required for a hierarchical society to qualify as just as opposed to unjust. In the field of international relations, readers consistently encounter democratic peace theory, the idea that liberal democracies are less likely to go to war. In response, many theorists append “with each other”: liberal democracies are less likely to go to war with each other, but still just as likely to go to war with non-democracies. Democracy may not be any more inherently peaceful than autocracy, but simply provide a modern nation with more allies.

The foundations of democracy are one thing; what of its use in practice today? In a ‘post-truth’ world, the very foundational concept of democracy – that the best, most qualified candidate will receive the most support – is not at all certain. Populist anti-establishment sentiment throws its weight against those with the most experience in government. In some cases, this is because they have records that are completely legitimate cause for mobilizing against them; in other cases, it simply prevents the wisdom of experience from being placed where it can do the most good. The same is true for the sort of reactionary sentiment that wanted out of the EU; rather than vote in a way that alters the parts of the status quo that are disliked, British Leave campaigners upset the entire table. It remains to be seen if any good will come of it.

 

“Congratulations to the new president of the United States Donald Trump and to the American people free!” Marine Le Pen tweeted.

Such anti-establishment sentiment is not the only issue in modern elections and referenda. If ‘fake news’ and verifiable, objective facts look overly similar to large sections of the population, there is no reason to think they will ask questions of sources that tend to confirm what they already believe. Democracy relies heavily on free, open exchanges of information and a civil society capable of distinguishing between fact and absolute fiction. There will always be partisanship in government until such time as the global structure achieves some cosmopolitan utopia (which does not appear to be on the horizon). However, for democracy to have any hope of serving the people, there must be a modicum of faith in the press. Someone somewhere must be assumed to be trustworthy and to be telling the truth.

Many of the governments we call democracies today are in essence democratic republics. An actual democracy is a government in which all citizens vote on all matters. Republics are usually made up of representatives or some patrician class who do the actual voting, though there may be varying levels of input from the common citizen. Does this help forestall the despotism Kant saw as inherent in a democracy? If consulted, many of the planners of the various democracies might confess to building republics for simplicity’s sake: there were too many people for them to vote on each issue that arose. Logistically it simply was not feasible. Here again, however, a structural issue emerges: can a system of government conceived by people who generally distrusted the white man on the street – and gave little or no thought to the women and men of color – ever evolve into a system that is truly egalitarian and just?

The global political order today is not all doom and gloom, despite what the BBC Breaking News banners might suggest. This October, an anti-immigrant referendum in Hungary did not pass after 50 percent of the electorate chose not to cast a vote; Polish women’s protests prevented abortion laws that infringed on the rights of people capable of bearing children in that country. In the Netherlands, Geert Wilders and his far-right Party for Freedom recently lost the general election in that country, despite their anti-Muslim populist rhetoric that has recently been popular with voters, both in Europe and in the United States. Democratic principles are not only mechanisms for showing the worst sides of a population. The voice of the people is just as loud when it speaks to demand a more open, egalitarian, compassionate society. If democracy becomes an end in itself, the very principles it is entrenched to protect may fall by the wayside.

Are those principles strong enough to hold what we expect them to hold? We the people who rely on democracy must be willing to face and acknowledge its weaknesses if there is to be any hope of keeping it functional. To know what lacuna are built into democracy and then act accordingly, building safeguards and shoring up weaknesses, is the best option for democracy’s survival. Democracies were built to be malleable; the people must take advantage of that malleability.

What do democratic decisions like Brexit, the election of Donald Trump, and Rodrigo Duterte’s election mean for our reliance on democracy? They mean it is working. They mean that the people will get exactly what they ask for. They mean that an electorate who will not critically engage, an electorate that does minimal independent research, an electorate of analog people in a newly-digital world will get exactly what they vote for. Confirmation bias did not disappear when the entire world of information arrived at our fingertips. Kant didn’t think women were people in the same way men were; most of his contemporaries, many of his heroes, and no small number of those who followed him all agreed. Kant was an intellectual giant, and he may have been right – democracy may in fact be the truest despotism. But Winston Churchill also looms large over our global political landscape, and he said, quoting an unknown writer, “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms.” In September, Germans go to the polls, with the far-right Alternative fuer Deutschland as one of their options. The French will vote until the 7th of May; they have their own far-right candidate, Marine le Pen, with whom to contend. If 2016 was the year that shook our faith in democracy, 2017 is capable of becoming the year that restores it.

Ashley Pratt is an International Relations Masters student in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London. She previously completed a degree at Arkansas State University in theatre with a minor in philosophy. Her research interests are on insurgency, just war theory, and human rights.

Notes:

[1] Kant, Immanuel. “Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch.” 99. In Kant’s Political Writings, 93–130. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid., 101.

[4] Ibid., 102.

Image 1 source: https://www.euractiv.com/section/elections/news/europes-extreme-right-leaders-revel-in-trumps-victory/

Image 2 source: https://pixabay.com/en/protest-protesters-demonstration-1300861/

Feature image: http://edition.cnn.com/2017/03/01/opinions/trump-speech-to-congress-reaction-opinion-roundup/