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OSUN Theme: Democratic Practice
The Rise of Authoritarian Populist Right: The Twilight of Liberal Democracy
Term:
January 16, 2023 – May 23, 2023
Levels
: 300-Level; 400-Level
Day/Time:
Wednesdays, 15:35-18:15 Bishkek Time | 04:35-07:15 New York Time | 10:35-13:15-Vienna Time
Credits
: 3 US / 6 ECTS
Prerequisite
: Knowledge of Comparative Politics, Comparative Political Systems and Political History
The end of the Cold War, conceptualized in the optimistic, if not self-congratulatory, declaration of the “end of history” ushered in an era of democracy promotion and liberal interventionism in international relations. With the end of the strategic, political, economic and ideological bipolarity of the Cold War, market economy-democracy-human rights-fundamental freedoms were to be adopted by all participants in the unipolar moment’s order safeguarded and legitimized by American power. 30 years on, the democratic expectations of the 1990’s as well as the promises of shared prosperity that globalization was meant to deliver were proven wanting, particularly in the developed, capitalist-democratic World. Following the financial and economic crises of 2008-2010 in the USA and Europe a latent anti-liberalism in economic as well as the political realms surfaced and staged a major challenge to the existing economic and political order in the West. The shifts in global economic power that resulted from the spread of capitalism and the ability of countries like China to take advantage of an open trade and investment system/environment led to a multidimensional challenge to the West. Managed capitalism or state capitalism trumped market capitalism in delivering the goods and authoritarian systems appeared more adept at facing the challenges of a disorienting transformation and finding responses to these more effectively. Democracies found themselves on the defensive on both counts. Increasingly at the core of the liberal capitalist system the disenchantment of the “losers” of globalization along with a surge of counter-liberal cultural sentiment fed a populist wave. Emanating from the people but decisively illiberal on core matters, populist movements inserted themselves at the center of politics and in countries where they attained power began to curtail fundamental liberties using in all such countries methods very similar to one another. Everywhere the freedom of the press was in the first line of attacks. Surveys quantifying democracy, fundamental rights and press freedom have all shown a decline in all of these fields. This course will analyze the contours of this trajectory in the world, use examples from both developed and developing countries discussing the populist surge and the commonalities one can find in different countries and expose the insidious destruction of press freedoms throughout the World. It will conclude with a search of the ways to counter these trends and restore the vitality of the expectations that the “refolutions” in Eastern Europe and elsewhere raised. Such a task would also necessitate a biopsy of the relations between information technology, citizenship and democracy.