Autocracy, Inc. by Anne Applebaum, Ch. 4, Changing the Operating System/Hegemony

From a Google Image Search – What’s so bad about multipolarity? – Al Majalla

When we look at politics in America at this moment, poised as we are to go to the polls to elect a new president, and when we realize that one candidate wants to change America’s operating system while the other candidate will stay within the parameters our founder’s and previous administrations have designed for us, we can’t help looking ahead and imagining what American governance will be like in the future. The world seems to be slowly converting to autocratic governments run by dictators who pay loyalists by turning them into oligarchs to ensure their continued loyalty. These oligarchs steal money from citizens, stashing it away in tax shelters or secret bank accounts allowing kleptocracy to exist together with autocracy. How grim life becomes for people who are not part of these governments depends on the temperament and ideology of the “dear leader.”

Autocracy is not as shocking in a country that has never been a democracy, which perhaps evolved from a monarchy to a communist government and then to a dictatorship. But it is shocking to hear autocratic echoes in America which has always been a democracy since it won the right to be a sovereign nation rather than a colony. (We could take a moment to bemoan our imperialism, but it won’t help us in this instance.)

“Sovereign” is a key term that autocrats like to use, Anne Applebaum tells us in Chapter 4 of her book, Autocracy, Inc. As in, we are a “sovereign” nation. Keep your laws out of our country. Mind your own government. Your human rights are not necessarily our human rights.

In a review of Timothy Snyder’s new book, On Freedom, in the New York Times, the reviewer reminds us that

“On Nov. 9 it will be 35 years since the Berlin Wall fell. The exhilaration of that moment was followed by high hopes for the spread of democracy throughout Eastern Europe, then in Russia itself when the Soviet Union imploded. Gradually hope gave way to frustration, disappointment and then dismay. Russia did not become a liberal democracy, and nor did a number of its former satrapies.”

Sovereignty means keep your mitts off my country, hegemony means my country belongs at the top of the heap because it has the strongest economy, government, and military. If America held the hegemony in the twentieth century, other nations, autocratic nations, are competing for hegemony in the twenty-first century and beyond. We didn’t necessarily need Anne Applebaum to tell us this. As humans, we understand human nature. Competition seems hardwired in humans and all living things. What Anne Applebaum is telling us is that autocrats might be uniting to woo underdeveloped countries with aid and support for their autocratic leaders to create a world-wide-web of autocratic nations for the strength in numbers that might shift hegemony from America and the West to China and/or Russia.

Where once (after WWII) human rights became a goal of the nations that beat the Nazis and did not end up behind the “Iron Curtain” of Stalin’s Russia, all bets are now off. Where once nations declared that “recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world. It is also acknowledged that ‘disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind.’…everyone has the right to life, liberty, and security of person. Applebaum continues to remind us of what was said in the shadow of Nazi genocide, “No one should be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention, or exile. Torture and slavery should be banned.” (p. 99)

Applebaum speaks of what has been collectively known as “the rules-based order. She goes on to say that how the world ought to work is not how it actually works, that many signatories have violated these rules, but that (for now) they still influence behavior in the real world.”(p. 100)

She warns us that powerful autocracies like China or Russia want to get rid of the language of these old agreements. Xi Jinping said this while addressing the Communist Party in 2017, “China seeks to take an active part in leading reform of the global governance system.” She tells us the remarks of Andrea Worden, a legal scholar and China expert, “For the CCP to attain the moral legitimacy, respect, and recognition it needs for leadership of a new world order, it must remove the threat of Western universal human rights.” (p.101)

She tells us what Putin has to say about sovereignty. “Sovereignty includes the right to abuse citizens at home and to invade others abroad. This privilege is available to only a very few large nations. There are not many countries in the world that have sovereignty.” (p.102)

Another term that is popular with autocrats right now according to Applebaum is the term “multipolarity” because it telegraphs an organization of autocratic states, banded together for greater power, stronger economics, and hegemony. Of course, hegemony is not up for grabs. As in Putin’s view on sovereignty, hegemony belongs to very few nations, or perhaps only one and that would be whatever country wins the hegemony competition, takes hegemony away from the US.

What does this have to do with America? A lot. We have an autocrat running to be our president right now and he has a passionate cult following. You might also want to read this article from today’s New York Times about what liberals may not realize about MAGAs.

If you are paying any attention to politics, then you must have heard that this is an existential election. Donald Trump is not only not a Democrat, but he also doesn’t put much stock in democracy. He likes strong men and sees himself as one of these alpha males. He wants to head America and go steady with other autocrats. He may even think that his presence alone will ensure America’s hegemony among autocratic nations.

Perhaps inciting your followers to violence is something strong leaders do, but Trump doesn’t like to take responsibility for the violence he incites. Other autocrats have no difficulty showing that they don’t just intimidate, they act (although often they still delegate violent actions to others). Donald Trump believes that by changing the rules he can change our minds. He believes his propaganda is more effective than 240 years of living in a democracy. Americans have no experience living in an autocratic state. Even if he wins one, it might be hard to keep it. How will it feel if he actually sends troops out to round up immigrants (both legal and illegal) and spends our tax dollars to deport them or puts them in “camps” which are nothing like sports camps or computer camps but more like the Japanese Internment camps.

China, Applebaum says, wants to change the language, to throw out “political rights” or “human rights” and replace it with squishy language like “win-win cooperation” and “mutual respect.” (pp. 102-3)”

When I read the book To Paradise by Hana Yanagihara (which was not an easy book because of the way it skipped around in place and time while focusing on one family and its descendants) the book offered glimpses of an America under the thumb of the Chinese government (the UK was still a free nation). The America she depicts bears little resemblance to our beloved democracy/republic. Applebaum’s careful discussion and her evidence for a future united autocratic institution (the anti-UN) is a warning that we are in danger of losing our access to whatever human rights we still treasure and that many nations around the world will rejoice if we choose autocracy, if we replace “the rule of law” with “rule by law” (or whatever the leader says).

“A world in which autocracies work together to stay in power, work together to promote their system, and work together to damage democracies is not some distant dystopia. That world is the one we are living in right now,” says Anne Applebaum. (p. 121)

Autocracy, Inc. by Anne Applebaum, Ch. 3, National Security and Government Control

From a Google Image Search – Politico

Anne Applebaum’s book has a subtitle, The Dictators Who Want to Run the World. From her perch in Poland, she has a nearer view of all the players, Russia, China, Syria, Iran, and Africa. Nations that are run by autocrats are using new technologies not only to spy on other countries (especially democracies) but also to spy on their own citizens. You might argue that nations need to know what their enemies, both foreign and domestic, are up to but there are more sinister motives at work here too. Chapter 3 in Autocracy, Inc. has the title, “Controlling the Narrative”.

The author begins by reminding Americans that our NSA is collecting data about US citizens as we were informed by Edward Snowden, a whistleblower or traitor, depending on your point of view, who is living as an exile in Russia. She also mentions Pegasus spyware in Poland which was eventually exposed and investigated.

“If no parallel scandal has ever unfolded in China, Russia, Iran, or North Korea, that’s because there are no legislative committees or free media that could play the same role.” (p. 71)

Applebaum reasons that when democracies use spyware it helps autocracies justify their abuse. If there are fewer objections to using spyware outside of China, then there will be fewer objections to using it inside of China.

In fact, we all expect that surveillance inside nations, even democracies, will escalate as new tech advances are developed. Why develop spyware if you won’t use it. Americans objected to the intrusions of the Patriot Act after the attacks on 9/11 but were so shaken by these brazen attacks on America that we accepted these rules while also believing that they would be temporary. They have been replaced by the USA Freedom Act which curtailed the government’s authority to collect data in 2015. Democrats in Congress strongly objected whenever Trump wanted to collect names of people in a group he wanted to target.

In China, objections can be deadly, as in Tiananmen Square in 1989. China, says Applebaum, first tried to eliminate the activists (people), then set out to eliminate the ideas such as the rule of law, the separation of powers, the right to free speech and the right to assemble which are described as “spiritual pollution”. (p. 66)

While Americans still believe, or say they believe that the internet would lead to a cultural renaissance, Applebaum predicted in 2012 that the internet would become a tool of control. China was designing “the Great Firewall of China” (p. 67) which used an “elaborate system of blocks and filters to prevent users from seeing particular words and tools. She tells us that foreign companies rushed into the new security market in the same way companies had rushed into the post-Soviet financial market. (Yahoo, Microsoft, Cisco Systems all made software that complied with China’s rules.) These companies were eased out once China had access to their software. (p. 68)

The security network was expanded by combining online tracking with tools of repression such as security cameras, police inspections and arrest. Other tools might include “nanny apps” on phones, monitoring book purchases, picking up on unusual behaviors, voice recognition, and even DNA swabs. All these tools have been used on the Uighur population in China. Now add in facial recognition and AI and you have a state that can truly control the narrative.

Anne Applebaum did not just write her book to expose state surveillance tactics. Perhaps she felt we needed to understand what might be coming to a place near you. These systems can be copied and have been copied by many nations including Pakistan, Brazil, Mexico, Serbia, South Africa and Turkey.

“The more China can bring other countries’ models of grievance into line with China’s own,” argues Steven Feldstein, an expert in digital technology, “the less these countries pose a threat to Chinese hegemony.” (Am I nervous about writing these words without a powerful husband such as Applebaum’s to make her a public figure and hard to attack – yes, I am sometimes paranoid.)

Russia plays a different game says Applebaum. Lie constantly and blatantly and when exposed offer no counterarguments. (p. 78) Blame everyone but yourself. This “fire hose of falsehoods” makes citizens question how you can possibly know what really happened and so they avoid politics altogether. Autocrats spread hopelessness and cynicism because it works to their advantage. This is not Russia’s only game. Russia is also a surveillance state.

Surveillance was a thing we worried about in the post-WWII world. We had all read Orwell’s 1984. We expected our freedom to include privacy. After the events of 9/11 we saw the need for some spying, both domestic and foreign, but we still hoped to not invade the homes of private citizens. Now, we are in an age where we live with hacking, with having our data stolen regularly, and with who knows how much surveillance because we can’t imagine our lives without the internet and cell phones.

Many American fully believe that if Trump and the right-wing MAGA’s win in 2024 all aspects of surveillance will be expanded and private citizens may be pursued because of the things they think and what they write or have written. Even without the MAGA’s in power, surveillance will most likely expand given all the autocracies that have cropped up everywhere. We may not be able to keep it focused on only foreign countries. This is one of our great fears of AI that it will be used by our government to control our behavior, regardless of what party you are registered with or the fact that you choose to not belong to a party.

“In seeking to create, these new propagandists, like their leaders, will reach for whatever ideology, whatever technology, and whatever emotions might be useful.”…Only the purpose never changes, Autocracy, Inc. hopes to rewrite the rules of the international system itself.” (p. 97)

Chapter 3 also goes into, in some detail, the changes in print and social media that are accompanying this rise in “spying”. Project 2025 will give MAGA carte blanche to spy on all Americans. Anne Applebaum’s book is a warning. Soon she will offer some remedies.

Tyranny of the Minority by Levitsky and Ziblatt – Book

From a Google Image Search – KALW

Sadly, not many Americans will read Tyranny of the Minority by Levitsky and Ziblatt. It’s not difficult to understand, but it is dense with historical evidence/proofs to back up the authors’ points. Still, this is an important book, and all citizens ought to read this treatise or at least read a summation of the points these two now-famous authors make. They are neither revolutionary nor extremist, but rather scholars who study democracies – why democracies work, how they work, and what dismantles them or makes them less democratic.

Americans revere the founders and our documents, the authors say, but our founders knew our Constitution would need to be revised and updated. Certain antique features that have remained as facets of our republic, which democracies that formed later did not include in their founding documents, have allowed a minority party to exploit these anti-majoritarian features to keep power even though their numbers are in the minority.

Chapter 1: Fear of Losing opens with a lesson from Argentina and the Peron family. This is a discussion of the peaceful transfer of power. At the time when our nation was formed handing over power was not the norm anywhere in the world. Also discussed is the struggle between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson when the Federalists wanted to hold on to power and Jefferson contemplated the use of violence. “Outsized fear of losing turns parties against democracy,” says one source. Examples from the German terms in office of Angela Merkel and from modern Thailand are also discussed.

Chapter 2: Banality tells the story of the crisis of a French party in 1934. What are the expectations of those who are loyal to democracy?

1. To respect the outcome of free/fair elections.

2. To reject the use of violence to stay in power.

3. To always break with undemocratic forces and watch out for semi-loyal democrats who play a passive role in democratic collapse.

“When mainstream parties protect authoritarian leaders, democracy dies.”

Those who back democracy must:

1. Expel anti-democratic members.

2. Sever all ties with groups that back anti-democratic behavior.

3. Loyal democrats must unambiguously decry violent acts and condemn them publicly. Semi-loyalists try to have it both ways.

4. Join forces with rival democratic parties to defeat authoritarianism.

Examples from Spain in 1936 are used to make their point along with Joe McCarthy’s Unamerican Activities campaign in America.

The authors list four ways to subvert laws:

1. Exploiting gaps or loopholes (Ex. denying Obama chance to name a Supreme Court Justice – had never happened before)

2. Excessive or undue use of the law (Ex. presidential pardons meant to be used sparingly, also impeachment).

3. Selective enforcement of laws.

4. Law-fare (as in warfare) – laws are used to target the opposition.

Orbán’s journey towards illiberal democracy in Hungary is summarized:

1. Voting system was changed

2. Purged and packed the courts.

3. Expanded numbers of judges in their supreme court.

4. Passed a law changing retirement age for justices. By 2013

the judiciary was a puppet of the government.

5. Media became a government propaganda arm.

6. Used constitutional hardball to change the way seats were filled on Electoral committees and retained control of parliament regardless of the popular vote.

Chapter 3: It Has Happened Here brings to our attention a time after the Civil War when freed Black men began to fill important positions in the government of Wilmington, NC. This seemed to open the door to multiracial politics until a group of prominent white Democrats launched a violent crusade to restore white rule (remember those Democrats are now Republicans as the parties switched in the 1960’s). It’s not a pretty story but you should know about it. The prospect of multiracial rule angered the South in part because it upended social and racial hierarchies.

Chapter 4: Why the Republican Party Abandoned Democracy

During the term of Lyndon Johnson and the passage of the 1964-65 Civil Rights Bills these reforms passed with votes from both parties. 60 years later, the authors say, the Republican party has become unrecognizable. He reminds us that Republican Mike Lee called for “liberty, peace and prosperity” but not democracy. They inform us about VDEM which issues an annual illiberalism score. The GOP’s illiberal score soared after 2000. Examples include the Republican’s “Southern Strategy” and State’s Rights and the added White Christian strategy of the “Moral Majority.” Once again the rise of multiracial society threatens the White party, the Republicans.” This chapter offers up the current situation in America.

Is the entire Republican Party anti-democratic? Answer these questions to determine their Democracy grade.

1. Did they sign on to the amicus brief to nullify votes in 2020?

2. Did they accede to manipulations of the Electoral College votes?

3. Did they cast doubt on the legality of the election?

4. Did they vote against Trump impeachment?

5. Were they against an independent commission to investigate 1/6?

6. Did they refuse to hold Steve Bannon in contempt for ignoring a subpoena?

Chapter 5: Fettered Majorities begins with a discussion of the disemboweling of the Voting Rights Act pre-clearance section in Shelby County v Holder and the 26 states that subsequently passed restrictive voting laws. Although Dems had total control when the John Lewis bill came to the floor the bill died again and again and finally two Democrats, Joe Manchin and Kirstin Sinema, killed it. A partisan minority is currently blocking majority power the author tells us. It can’t be too easy to change the rules in a democracy and it can’t be too difficult to change the rules either. We protect minority rights, but we are learning that there can also be a tyranny of the minority. In addition, one generation can tie the hands of future generations far into the future.

Chapter 6: Minority Rule begins with a discussion of German “bread lords” and the urban/rural divide in Germany at that time. Political institutions were frozen in place despite demographic and social changes. We are experiencing that same situation in 21st century America. Only in the 21st century have counter-majoritarian rules benefited a single political party. This is due to the same urban/rural divide encountered by the Germans in the 20th century. We now have a rural state bias in the US Senate, the Electoral College, and the Supreme Court. As a result, say the authors, “we run the risk of descending into ‘minority rule’.” They explain in some detail.

Chapter 7: America The Outlier explores how a country (America) that set out to find an audacious new idea for government has now fallen behind other democracies on scores determined by Freedom House. Most countries dismantled undemocratic sections of their constitutions. Elections would no longer be determined by “first past the post” rules. Upper chambers of government were no longer elitist, but either more representative or no longer existed at all. Cloture rules were simple as opposed to our filibuster rules which allow minorities parties to delay cloture altogether. Judicial review which allows Supreme Courts to overrule legislative laws is an area that has not been reformed. Other nations have laws about term limits for judges or specify a retirement age, which we do not. We have made some changes to rules to make them less counter-majoritarian as with the laws that allow direct elections of Senators, but we have kept most of the laws mentioned above. “The US” the authors say, is a democratic laggard.” We have the hardest constitution to change and are now the least democratic of the world’s democracies.

Chapter 8: Democratizing Our Democracy is necessary because in America majorities do not really rule. Remedies are offered up by the authors and most of them have to do with upholding the right to vote. I should not steal the author’s thunder by offering potential readers a comprehensive list. You really should read the book. However, here are a few of the suggestions:

1. Establish automatic voter registration.

2. Expand mail-in and early voting

3. Schedule elections on weekends or holidays.

4. Restore national voting rights with federal oversight.

5. Ensure that elections results reflect what people want.

6. Abolish the Electoral College

7. Reform Senate to be proportional to the population.

8. Eliminate partisan gerrymandering.

9. Abolish the Senate filibuster, etc.

10. Make it easier to amend the Constitution.

This is an important book, and it is well-researched. I did not get to read a print version because I was having cataract surgery (which has turned out well). Listening to an academic book that reads like a text is not ideal. Page numbers to give attribution for direct quotes are not available and some quotes get missed because they go by too fast. This is a book that would be best added to your library in print so that you could refer to it as necessary. I had to take notes. These two authors will most likely not be heard by those who need to hear/read these truths because of our current partisan divide but Levitsky and Ziblatt are fighting along with many of us to save our democracy. Their academic approach adds gravitas to the points those of us who love democracy are trying to make.