Fear

Eduardo del Buey
Foto: Afp
La Jornada Maya

Martes 11 de diciembre, 2018

In his inaugural address in 1932, then U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt said “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance”.

Fear.

Today it seems that the exploitation of fear is becoming rampant around the world by those who would govern in undemocratic ways. Populist illiberals count on the fears held by many to achieve and consolidate power.

What fear, you may ask?

Fear of a world that they no longer understand. A fear of power that has been separated from politics. Politics continue to be local and national, whereas power is international and global. Governments no longer fully control their own economies or fiscal policies especially when tied together by common currencies. The World Trade Organization, the European Union, and other unelected bodies pass regulations that impact local citizens with little or even no input from them or their elected officials. Rapid changes in technology and global trade have facilitated the movement of capital to the point where governments no longer fully control it. In short, many citizens feel that they have little to no control over the globalized entities that decide their fates. Indeed, they never did, but populists are convincing them to act out their frustrations today as they did in Germany in the 1930’s.

In many cases, the power to create fiscal and economic policies and to protect jobs has shifted from governments to international networks that govern investments around the world. Multinational companies and banks can transfer funds and jobs to other countries or markets with little control by national governments.

Artificial intelligence continues to grow in quantum leaps. Without proper planning, policies and retraining, this threatens to permanently erase jobs and employment opportunities not only from the un- or under-educated, but also from graduates whose studies from five years ago may no longer be relevant in today’s economy.

One has only to evaluate the changes in the world economy since the advent of the iPhone in 2007. Access to information and its dissemination has grown exponentially – and in the palm of our hands. One has only to see how the rapid rate of technological change has decimated whole industries like film, photography, local news broadcasting, print newspapers, as well as video and music retail, to understand the fear that permeates many levels of society.

One has only to ask how globalization may well have created millions of lower paying jobs with fewer benefits than before but has also created huge disparities in the accumulated wealth of global citizens. How much of the international economy does the 1 percent control? How many can aspire to joining that 1 percent or even see it grow into a 2 percent or 3 percent?

Governments and liberal leaders lack the answers to the concerns of millions of citizens. This has led to widespread frustration with current political institutions and a desire to fall for the temptation of the quick fix.

As political science professor Patrick J. Deneen has noted in his recent book [i]Why Liberalism Failed[/i], today’s widespread yearning for a strong leader, one with the will to take back popular control over liberalism’s forms of bureaucratized government and globalized economy, comes after decades of liberal dismantling of cultural norms and political habits essential to self-governance.

Fear?

Fear that what once were lifelong careers now have a very short life-span. That, when students graduate, there will be no jobs for them, or that jobs will be rendered obsolete in a few years. Careers that require a massive financial investment on the part of individuals in terms of education only to find themselves saddled with huge debts and little chance to repay them.

Fear of never being able to own their own homes because the wage and price differential makes this dream simply unattainable. As vast amounts of investment from newly emerging economies drive up real estate values, home ownership becomes a pipe dream to many, including university graduates who have invested important amounts of money in their educations.

Fear of reaching an ever longer old-age with no way to survive economically.

Fear of seeing one’s culture, values and traditions fall victim to uncontrolled migration and the creeping influence of globalized values.

Most of all, fear of being irrelevant in today’s world and economy. A world in which education systems more often than not do little to prepare the individual to survive in a world where perpetual change is the only constant and the ability to manage change is, as Charles Darwin noted two centuries ago, the key element of survival.

Am I being unnecessarily negative, or is the world becoming a tougher place in which to survive?

Can liberal leaders find ways to make local politics relevant in a globalized world? Can they define a sense of purpose in an economy and society governed increasingly by algorithms rather that by human sensitivity? Can we measure our socio-economic worth in a world in which a small fraction enjoys the benefits of economic development while the rest are left to wallow with little hope of making it?

These are the challenges facing liberal democracy, and these are the fears upon which populist illiberals are building their political discourse.

Sometimes, I am sometimes advised to be more positive in my outlook.

I would love to be.

But I am becoming increasingly pessimistic that the liberal democratic traditions with which I grew up and that have guided my civic thinking are being submerged in a sea of despair that populist illiberals are manipulating to their advantage.

Do you think I am wrong?

President Donald Trump is destroying a once proud liberal tradition and experiment in governance in the United States and, by example, in many other countries. Europeans are responding in greater numbers to the siren calls of illiberal populists. Indeed, populists already form the governments of Poland, Hungary, Austria and Italy, the official opposition in Germany, Switzerland, and Sweden, and enjoy a solid base of support in France and the Netherlands. The current British government is slowly crumbling under the weight of the BREXIT debate, and Venezuela is a basket case. The recent election of Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro also reflects the frustrations of Brazilians with traditional politics and their willingness to assign leadership to a populist authoritarian.

Even countries like Canada, built by immigrants, are not immune to populist politics. In the last general election in 2015, Canada’s then ruling Conservative Party proposed, as part of its unsuccessful re-election platform, the setting up of a hotline for people to report “barbaric practices”, which many voters took as a euphemism for anti-Muslim sentiments.

The current Conservative opposition leader Andrew Scheer has declared war on the media, and the Conservative Coalition Avenir Quebec (that won the recent provincial election) included a plank in its platform that would see immigrants deported from Quebec if they did not prove that they had learned French within three years of arrival.

The current Premier of Ontario, Doug Ford, has tried to roll back legislation aimed at providing education in French to the French speaking minority in that Canadian province. Fortunately, the public outcry from across Canada was strong and vocal, and he has begun to pull back somewhat. Ford’s retreat, whether partial or complete, temporary or permanent, demonstrates that if people fight back on principle when an autocratic populist begins to unwind his pitch, he can be stopped. Ford’s hero continues to be, as he has publicly admitted, Donald Trump.

While I am critical of these leaders’ policies and viewpoints, the fact of the matter is that they and many other populist autocrats have been elected to office democratically. Yet Hitler in Germany, Chavez in Venezuela, Erdogan in Turkey, Orban in Hungary, and Ortega in Nicaragua, among others, went on to usurp power once in office and destroy their countries in the process.

They were elected because of fear of reality on the one hand, and frustration with the status quo of gridlocked politics and elusive economic opportunities on the other.

And the reasons for their frustrations and fears are growing stronger today.

The demographics, cultural, economic, and social challenges facing humanity are myriad.

I see very few leaders of any persuasion who understand these phenomena that are already affecting us.

Are liberal leaders focusing on the role artificial intelligence is playing in the future of jobs? Can they come up with sensible ways to work with the world-wide financial and business networks to achieve a more equitable distribution of wealth? Can liberal political leaders explain how they will address the challenges posed by crypto-currencies on national and global financial systems.

Can leaders create educational systems that combine the technical and humanistic subjects for study that will determine the relevance of the individual in tomorrow’s job market. And can leaders propose ideas to stem the flows of human beings fleeing violence and oppression who are, unfortunately and inadvertently, contributing to the fear of others as well as living through the hell of their own fears?

Or will they simply yield the terrain to populist authoritarian leaders who talk a good talk but lack a commitment to a functioning democracy, the separation of powers, and will stifle control over their power once elected?

Fear?

It seems to permeate our political, economic, and social thinking nationally and globally.

And that is a reason to fear.

[b][email protected][/b]