History The Future of Freedom In his book, The Future of Freedom, Fareed Zakaria writes that we must make democracy safe for the world. The American democracy sets the standard around the world for liberal democracies, but transitions across for other countries across the world toward a liberal democracy is often difficult and with poor decision making, close to impossible. Liberal democracies are the systems in which people choose their government and live in an environment of freedom. In Zakaria’s book, he warns the readers of several telltale signs that their process toward a liberal democracy is in trouble. He uses examples of different countries doing it right and doing it wrong- the ones discussed in this essay will be Russia and China. After the communist collapse in Russia, Zakaria writes that Russia concentrated too much on a quick fix.
The leaders wanted to mimic the American democracy an instituted “free and fair elections,” but they forgot about establishing a stable economy. Robert Kaplan writes in his essay, “Was Democracy Just a Moment?” that countries need to establish a stable economic system before they try to institute a political system or else that political system will fail. Specifically, Kaplan thinks that there should be a strong and large middle class in the nation before it leaders think democracy will work. Kaplan was not the only intellectual to say this; Aristotle believed that a strong middle class bred a strong society. The idea about this is that democracy cannot work if the majority of a country is poor and starving while a small minority has all the money.
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The poor will be too preoccupied with trying to survive than maintaining the government. Russia relied too much on its natural resources instead of trying to build a functioning economy (Zakaria, 92).
Zakaria writes, “Russia’s fundamental problem is not that it is a poor country struggling to modernize, but rather that it is a rich country struggling to modernize” (92).
By making the mistake of first fixing the political system before the economy, and then mismanaging its resources, Russia’s political system fell prey to corruption. Zakaria writes, “Yeltsin did little to build institutions in Russia. In fact he weakened almost all competing centers of power-the legislature, the courts, regional governors” (93).
The problem with what Yeltsin did is that if the other branches are not strong and competing against each other, than it opens the government to corruption, and worst, a dictatorship. The founding fathers of America put in the checks and balances to avoid what Yeltsin did, and to promote active and healthy competition and to make sure that no branch could become too powerful. Can Democracy ever be safe in Russia? With the dominating power within the presidential position in the Russian political system, Putin is trying to eliminate the corruption in Russian politics (Zakaria, 95).
Zakaria writes, “But when Putin unleashes the secret police on businessmen or politicians whom he dislikes, he is undermining the law” (95).
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Political leaders fear if no one is there to check the president, no matter how corrupt they are, it opens the presidential seat to dictatorship (Zakaria, 95).
Putin, however, believes order will bring about a liberal democracy. Maybe there is a chance for Russia to achieve a liberal democracy, but not by the means of how most want it. Strong leader leads to some stability, which leads to a stable economy, which leads to a liberal democracy. Zakaria writes that this is an illiberal democracy potentially leading to a liberal democracy.
Putin’s methods are not ideal but they are bringing about results but with a strong-arm leader, as Putin, Zakaria feels it is risky business. The other country in question is China. The China is trying to reform the Chinese economy wile holding on to power (Zakaria, 81).
Zakaria writes, ” ‘The experiment’ is the Chinese leaders’ attempt to modernize China by opening its economy but holding political change in check” (81).
The government knows that the economic changes have the potential of bringing about political changes; the question is whether they will allow it. Zakaria writes, “They know that to introduce capitalism into China requires much more than economic changes, so they have allowed significant reforms of the administrative and legal systems as well” (81).
Although Zakaria argues that China must reform its political system, he says a quick transition to a liberal democracy can lead to chaos, because of the large size of the country and the small size of its middle class. Other reasons, and probably more realistic reasons for China’s slow progression towards a democratic state is that the leaders want to clasp to its stronghold on the political system. Can democracy work in China? Zakaria feels it cannot be ignored the progress the Chinese economy has had under its state as a free economy. But the problem continues to be the political progress of this country. China still only has a small middle class, which is detrimental towards a functioning liberal democracy. During the 1980 s, there were pushes for political reform from members of the political scene as well as from the public but all that came to a halt during the massacre in Tiananmen Square when soldiers stomped out the early fires of democracy (Zakaria, 83).
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But in 1992, China’s leader, Deng Xiaoping, gave his blessing for open economic markets (Zakaria, 83).
That leads us to the present time. With examples like Singapore, China hopes to maintain its current situation. Zakaria writes, “Their role model is former prime minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore. Lee achieved the dream of every strongmen: to modernize the economy, even the society, of his country, but not the politics” (85).
Ironically, Zakaria feels Chinese officials should return to the teachings of Karl Marx for help.
He writes, “Marx understood that when a country modernizes its economy, embraces capitalism, and creates a bourgeoisie, the political system will change to reflect that transformation” (Zakaria, 87).
Zakaria holds hope that the leaders will come around and accept the inevitability of China eventually becoming a liberal democracy. All of those involved, realize that that process will be a long and strenuous one because hardly any leader ever gives up his power willingly. Works Cited Kaplan, Robert D. “Was Democracy Just a Moment?” The Atlantic Monthly. Boston: December, 1997.
Zakaria, Fareed. The Future of Freedom. W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. : New York, 2004..
