ideon Rachman is one of the rare public foreign affairs intellectuals/journalists that I regularly read and enjoy. Whilst I don’t always agree with his analysis (which is itself a good thing), it is grounded and reflective in a way that many simply are not. Reading the opinion pages of the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times usually leads to eye-rolls and guffaws – which lead to an occasional odd look from passersby – especially from some of the more well-known names (we all know who they are).
As FT’s Chief Foreign Affairs Columnist, Rachman is uniquely suited to reflect on sweeping international developments and summarize them for his readers. In his latest book “The Age of the Strongman” Rachman does just this, exploring the emergence of the new wave of strongman-ism (my turn of phrase, not his). Rachman reflects on the modern world, where he sees liberal democracy eroding and authoritarianism rising in countries from Russia to the U.S., Turkey to the United Kingdom, with a few bulwarks like France and Germany in between. He sees President Joe Biden’s primary task as reinvigorating liberal democracy and reasserting its attendant values in the face of such authoritarian pressures, both at home and abroad.
Thumbing through the book I initially shared the concerns Sir Alex Younger (the former Chief of SIS) expressed in his FT review of “The Age of the Strongman”: that lumping such a diverse group of ostensible strongmen (and, thus far it is all men) into one group would be too much of a stretch. There is a big difference between tendencies/behaviors and actually being a strongman or authoritarian. The gulf between Prime Minister Boris Johnson and President Vladimir Putin, despite what some polemicists would suggest, is quite large—the former has yet to poison Sir Keir Starmer…yet.
Those concerns were unfounded as Rachman does a masterful job of capturing the individuals as individuals and their distinct behaviors. As standalone biographies they are sharp and poignant, highlighting what makes the individual leader a strongman, but also how they fit into the broader spectrum of authoritarianism. He rightly differentiates authoritarian behaviors, odious though they may be, from outright corruption and democratic subversion. The vignettes are great miniature biographies as much as they serve to advance Rachman’s argument of the evolution and growth of authoritarian tendencies in ostensible democracies, liberal or otherwise.
Reading these entries, one does wish that Rachman sat with the individual authoritarians and the conditions that gave rise to the strongman more than he does. While it would undoubtedly be a much longer book, it would be useful. All of these figures seized upon underlying domestic political conditions, fears, and concerns (real or otherwise) as much as they created conditions for their rise. To be sure, once in office they manipulated the courts, upset democratic norms, attacked the press, and comported themselves as a strongman would (to varying degrees). Yet it is these underlying issues that deserve due consideration if we are to fully understand why the strongman emerged in the first place.
There is an underlying theme that Rachman doesn’t fully explore though one can’t help but pick it up when reading his enjoyable book. We may finally be witnessing the death of the assumption of liberal democracy’s unchallenged ascendency. Francis Fukuyama’s oft cited but rarely read, “End of History” is often pointed to as one of the progenitors of this assumption—that in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, liberal democracy is the only viable system that is left.
That assumption seems to have underpinned an intellectual arrogance and idleness, not limited to the Western world. Surely, many thought, liberal democracy is the apotheosis of human development and nothing can undermine its expansion. The very fields that gave rise to and sustained liberal democracy’s expansion were left fallow and untended. The weeds of authoritarianism, corruption, demagoguery, and populism went unchecked. The assumption that liberal democracy would flow East was supplanted by the reality that kleptocracy and instability flowed West.
Such a proposition is horribly dangerous as an intellectual framework left alone as a foundation for policy (just look at America’s policy toward China), which it arguably was for so long. The lack of democratic stewardship in the United States undoubtedly contributed to its erosion abroad. Civic engagement in America has fallen precipitously (beyond the ballot box), but more alarmingly civic knowledge and understanding—so much so that the events of 6 January were tacitly or explicitly condoned by many, even within a major political party. Social media has led to an increased polarization and the belief that politics is a zero-sum game—and exposed a punitive streak in politics: the other side is wrong and should be made to suffer as a consequence.
At the same time, liberal democracy itself has not kept up with the demands placed upon it by citizens themselves resulting from the changes in the global economy. As Rachman writes, this is a consistent theme that gives rise to first grievance and then, later, strongmen seizing upon said grievance. If the Global Trends 2040 report authored by Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) is to be believed, the delta between expectations and the ability of governments to deliver is only set to grow in the coming years. This will create and exacerbate tensions within states and could well give rise to yet another generation of strong persons (as one suspects it is only a matter of time before a female leader rises to the fore using similar tactics).
Rachman’s analysis runs, unfortunately, into challenges of reality and geopolitics. As odious as some of these individuals’ behaviors may be, Washington and other capitals will still need to deal with them to address practical issues of security, economics, diplomacy, and climate change. This has always been the case. By way of example, two of the founding members of NATO were dictatorships when they joined—Greece and Turkey—and South Korea was a military dictatorship until 1979. Today, Hungary under Viktor Orbán is both a member of NATO and the EU. Washington works (haltingly) with China under General Secretary Xi Jinping on economic policy, security issues, and will need to do so on climate change, and works with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia to manage Iran.
Values and principles are critically important and should certainly guide policy, but they are an insufficient framework alone on which to make policy in the real world. The liberal international order did not come to the defense of Ukraine until Russian tanks were crossing the border. President Putin’s authoritarian tendencies were fine within Russia, it only became an issue when it spread beyond its borders. Washington may decry the treatment of the Uyghurs and Tibet, or Beijing’s development of an Orwellian social credit score, but securing a favorable trade deal and stymying Zhongnanhai’s hegemonic ambitions is of far greater importance.
Indeed, the AUKUS agreement and similar efforts may have a grounding in similar lexicons of liberalism, democracy, and rule of law, but the key driver was a hard power security concern—China. That they speak English just made it that much easier. Further, that the Quad includes India under Narendra Modi, whose behavior is clearly of a strongman ilk, illustrates just how willing states are to put concerns about authoritarian tone and style aside in the name of pragmatism.
It is tempting to confuse tactics or operational behavior with long-term strategic activity. Rachman notes that we could well be in the latest cycle of strongman authoritarianism, which could just as quickly ebb from view. That remains very much an open question and assumes a measure of resilience in liberal democracies which are very different from country to country. Even if the excesses of the strongmen profiled by Rachman are constrained, those aforementioned political and economic strains will likely remain. If those are unaddressed, there is little to suggest that national populations won’t welcome a strongman or populist back into office—or demand that one emerges.
In the main, Rachman’s book is a welcome reflection on the global state of liberal democracy at its erosion in the face of rising authoritarian tendencies. Not surprisingly, “The Age of the Strongman” is very much in keeping with Rachman’s excellent columns: a sweeping, globe-trotting, well-informed, and thought-provoking reflection on global trends.
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The Erosion of Liberal Democracy and the Rise of Strongman-ism
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May 7, 2022
Gideon Rachman's new book "The Age of the Strongman" engages with the erosion of liberal democracy in an analytical, thoughtful way - but despite it's welcome thoughtfulness it fails to account for the likely unwillingness of populations to accept strongman-ism, writes Joshua Huminski.
G
ideon Rachman is one of the rare public foreign affairs intellectuals/journalists that I regularly read and enjoy. Whilst I don’t always agree with his analysis (which is itself a good thing), it is grounded and reflective in a way that many simply are not. Reading the opinion pages of the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times usually leads to eye-rolls and guffaws – which lead to an occasional odd look from passersby – especially from some of the more well-known names (we all know who they are).
As FT’s Chief Foreign Affairs Columnist, Rachman is uniquely suited to reflect on sweeping international developments and summarize them for his readers. In his latest book “The Age of the Strongman” Rachman does just this, exploring the emergence of the new wave of strongman-ism (my turn of phrase, not his). Rachman reflects on the modern world, where he sees liberal democracy eroding and authoritarianism rising in countries from Russia to the U.S., Turkey to the United Kingdom, with a few bulwarks like France and Germany in between. He sees President Joe Biden’s primary task as reinvigorating liberal democracy and reasserting its attendant values in the face of such authoritarian pressures, both at home and abroad.
Thumbing through the book I initially shared the concerns Sir Alex Younger (the former Chief of SIS) expressed in his FT review of “The Age of the Strongman”: that lumping such a diverse group of ostensible strongmen (and, thus far it is all men) into one group would be too much of a stretch. There is a big difference between tendencies/behaviors and actually being a strongman or authoritarian. The gulf between Prime Minister Boris Johnson and President Vladimir Putin, despite what some polemicists would suggest, is quite large—the former has yet to poison Sir Keir Starmer…yet.
Those concerns were unfounded as Rachman does a masterful job of capturing the individuals as individuals and their distinct behaviors. As standalone biographies they are sharp and poignant, highlighting what makes the individual leader a strongman, but also how they fit into the broader spectrum of authoritarianism. He rightly differentiates authoritarian behaviors, odious though they may be, from outright corruption and democratic subversion. The vignettes are great miniature biographies as much as they serve to advance Rachman’s argument of the evolution and growth of authoritarian tendencies in ostensible democracies, liberal or otherwise.
Reading these entries, one does wish that Rachman sat with the individual authoritarians and the conditions that gave rise to the strongman more than he does. While it would undoubtedly be a much longer book, it would be useful. All of these figures seized upon underlying domestic political conditions, fears, and concerns (real or otherwise) as much as they created conditions for their rise. To be sure, once in office they manipulated the courts, upset democratic norms, attacked the press, and comported themselves as a strongman would (to varying degrees). Yet it is these underlying issues that deserve due consideration if we are to fully understand why the strongman emerged in the first place.
There is an underlying theme that Rachman doesn’t fully explore though one can’t help but pick it up when reading his enjoyable book. We may finally be witnessing the death of the assumption of liberal democracy’s unchallenged ascendency. Francis Fukuyama’s oft cited but rarely read, “End of History” is often pointed to as one of the progenitors of this assumption—that in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, liberal democracy is the only viable system that is left.
That assumption seems to have underpinned an intellectual arrogance and idleness, not limited to the Western world. Surely, many thought, liberal democracy is the apotheosis of human development and nothing can undermine its expansion. The very fields that gave rise to and sustained liberal democracy’s expansion were left fallow and untended. The weeds of authoritarianism, corruption, demagoguery, and populism went unchecked. The assumption that liberal democracy would flow East was supplanted by the reality that kleptocracy and instability flowed West.
Such a proposition is horribly dangerous as an intellectual framework left alone as a foundation for policy (just look at America’s policy toward China), which it arguably was for so long. The lack of democratic stewardship in the United States undoubtedly contributed to its erosion abroad. Civic engagement in America has fallen precipitously (beyond the ballot box), but more alarmingly civic knowledge and understanding—so much so that the events of 6 January were tacitly or explicitly condoned by many, even within a major political party. Social media has led to an increased polarization and the belief that politics is a zero-sum game—and exposed a punitive streak in politics: the other side is wrong and should be made to suffer as a consequence.
At the same time, liberal democracy itself has not kept up with the demands placed upon it by citizens themselves resulting from the changes in the global economy. As Rachman writes, this is a consistent theme that gives rise to first grievance and then, later, strongmen seizing upon said grievance. If the Global Trends 2040 report authored by Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) is to be believed, the delta between expectations and the ability of governments to deliver is only set to grow in the coming years. This will create and exacerbate tensions within states and could well give rise to yet another generation of strong persons (as one suspects it is only a matter of time before a female leader rises to the fore using similar tactics).
Rachman’s analysis runs, unfortunately, into challenges of reality and geopolitics. As odious as some of these individuals’ behaviors may be, Washington and other capitals will still need to deal with them to address practical issues of security, economics, diplomacy, and climate change. This has always been the case. By way of example, two of the founding members of NATO were dictatorships when they joined—Greece and Turkey—and South Korea was a military dictatorship until 1979. Today, Hungary under Viktor Orbán is both a member of NATO and the EU. Washington works (haltingly) with China under General Secretary Xi Jinping on economic policy, security issues, and will need to do so on climate change, and works with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia to manage Iran.
Values and principles are critically important and should certainly guide policy, but they are an insufficient framework alone on which to make policy in the real world. The liberal international order did not come to the defense of Ukraine until Russian tanks were crossing the border. President Putin’s authoritarian tendencies were fine within Russia, it only became an issue when it spread beyond its borders. Washington may decry the treatment of the Uyghurs and Tibet, or Beijing’s development of an Orwellian social credit score, but securing a favorable trade deal and stymying Zhongnanhai’s hegemonic ambitions is of far greater importance.
Indeed, the AUKUS agreement and similar efforts may have a grounding in similar lexicons of liberalism, democracy, and rule of law, but the key driver was a hard power security concern—China. That they speak English just made it that much easier. Further, that the Quad includes India under Narendra Modi, whose behavior is clearly of a strongman ilk, illustrates just how willing states are to put concerns about authoritarian tone and style aside in the name of pragmatism.
It is tempting to confuse tactics or operational behavior with long-term strategic activity. Rachman notes that we could well be in the latest cycle of strongman authoritarianism, which could just as quickly ebb from view. That remains very much an open question and assumes a measure of resilience in liberal democracies which are very different from country to country. Even if the excesses of the strongmen profiled by Rachman are constrained, those aforementioned political and economic strains will likely remain. If those are unaddressed, there is little to suggest that national populations won’t welcome a strongman or populist back into office—or demand that one emerges.
In the main, Rachman’s book is a welcome reflection on the global state of liberal democracy at its erosion in the face of rising authoritarian tendencies. Not surprisingly, “The Age of the Strongman” is very much in keeping with Rachman’s excellent columns: a sweeping, globe-trotting, well-informed, and thought-provoking reflection on global trends.
