“There is a sardonic truth that we rely on liberal democracy as a system of government to secure our rights—and only really recognise it by its absence,” argues IlvesToomas
a teenager in 1940 when the Soviet Union invaded Estonia. An orphan and poor, he was largely oblivious to the changes—until June 14th 1941. On that day, working a summer job at the railyards in Tallinn, he saw thousands of Estonians pushed at bayonet-point into hundreds of Russian cattle cars, 30 or 40 to a wagon. Men, women and children were separated and sent to different parts of Siberia.
It means censorship—and self-censorship, for fear of being critical of the regime. In many cases it means suppression of your culture if it is not permitted. In less extreme forms, a weakening of liberal democracy invites corruption: crony deals and family connections. It’s the untalented daughter of the party or corporate bigwig who gets a scarce seat at a good university, or the son, driving drunk, who slams into a pedestrian but never faces charges.
Losing democracy, a trend over the past decade, happens in much the same way as a character goes bankrupt in Ernest Hemingway’s “The Sun Also Rises”: “gradually, and then suddenly”. At first the changes are minor—a shift in tone, a reinterpretation of rules, a weakening of independent oversight. It’s just enough to get political opponents and independent media howling but not so much to cause unease in the public.
It hardly helps that some elites in democracies have become veritable partners in crime, by in effect colluding with authoritarian countries in return for business or donations. The cronies’ cash is laundered, or the country wins respectability by financing research but insists on erasing criticism.
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