But, of course, these are only two example. His final chapter expands his horizons to democratic transition in other countries. In particular, Zimblatt focuses on the importance of forming a strong conservative party before democratizing. He cites Sweden, Denmark, Belgium and the Netherlands as examples of countries with strong conservative parties that made a smooth, untumultuous, and successful democratic transition. By contrast, Spain, Portugal and Italy failed in the transition. France is an intermediate category.
Spain is a particularly interesting example. Although Zimblatt seems to support my hypothesis that generally the danger lies on the right, there are exceptions. Spain is an interesting example. In Spain, the right wing, lacking a strong, democratic political party, instead rigged the system in such a way as to systematically shut out the left. The left responded by becoming radicalized and increasingly dangerous and authoritarian, leading the right to have increasingly legitimate fears and resort to ever more extreme methods to exclude the left. This may be in line with my hypotheses both that out-of-control polarization is a major cause of democratic downfall, and that the left is most dangerous in a government that is really a right-wing oligarchy merely masquerading as a democracy.
Spain's example is in contrast to Britain, where the Conservatives recognized that the Labour Party must be allowed to be competitive in elections or it would become radicalized, and it worked. The British Labour Party became an eminently respectable party that followed the democratic rules of the game. This would suggest that what is needed is not just a party of the right that can win in fair elections, but also a party of the left that can win elections, and that systematically shutting anyone out of power is the road to ruin. On the other hand, Zimblatt makes clear that 19th century German conservatives systematically shut out the left-wing Social Democrat. And while some of the Social Democrats became radicalized and ultimately formed the Communist Party, it also remained true that the majority continued to respect democratic norms long after everyone else had abandoned them. That really needs some exploration.
Zimblatt's account of France is maddeningly vague and truncated. He treats France as a stable democracy from 1879 to 1918. (No mention of the Dreyfus Affair, which threatened the Third Republic in the 1890's, but ultimately blew over). In 1919, the right won a parliamentary majority, which it had rarely done since the 1870's. Again unaddressed, if a conservative party that can win is essential to the survival of democracy, how did the Third Republic survive shutting out the right for so long? And why did the Third Republic start coming unglued after the right came back to power? Why did the right endure being shut out of power for so long, only to turn against the Republican when normal alternation of power resumed? Any serious analysis would require considerably more space than Zimblatt offers.
,
Zimblatt also makes some interesting comments about present-day democratic transitions. In 19th century Europe, the greatest foe of democracy was the landed aristocracy -- the pre-democratic ruling class, reluctant to lose its power. Landed aristocracies are no longer a serious factor much of anywhere these days. In their place is military rule one-party states, or patrimonialism. Zimblatt suggests that democratic transitions were successful in South Korea, Taiwan and Indonesia because the old elite had a political party in place that could make the transition to a competitive democratic party. Likewise, he suggests that democratic transition failed in Egypt and might succeed in Tunisia because Tunisia allowed the old ruling party to integrate into the new order in ways that Egypt did not.*
But if Zimblatt's discussion of Britain and Germany is mind-numbingly detailed, his accounts of other countries are too brief to be very informative.
Next: The U.S. in Zimblatt's formulation.
_______________________________________________
*He does not discuss democratic transition in the ex-Communist countries of Eastern Europe. These are an unusual case in that the Communists were essentially a collaborationist government installed by a foreign power, with no domestic base of support. This may mean that the usual rules of democratic transition do not apply.
No comments:
Post a Comment