Just Finished Reading: How Democracy Ends by David Runciman (FP: 2018) [224pp]

Thinking about the end of Democracy is almost as difficult as thinking about the end of Capitalism. Although Democracy has a long history, going way back to the ancient Greek city of Athens, in its recognisable modern form it’s only a few hundred years old or, if you take it as only valid under universal franchise, around 100 years old in most western nations. Clearly Democracy wasn’t the normal form of government for most of human history and there will, inevitably, be a time after Democracy just as there was a LONG time before it. But how exactly will Democracy end? That’s what this fascinating little book hopes to answer – or at least meaningfully speculate about.

The author essentially puts forward 4 scenarios where Democracy fails in some fashion. The first is in a Coup. The author considers the odds of any established democracy anywhere in the world falling to a coup to be very low indeed. He even states that “No democracy has reverted to military rule once GDP is greater than $8,000 per person”. I don’t know if that’s true but it wouldn’t hugely surprise me. Coups can only be successful when a population has little or no investment – in all its senses – in their government or the structure of the state. It is difficult indeed even conceiving of anywhere where democracy has set down roots that such a thing could occur. The problem I can think of here is exactly how you define the regimes across the world as democratic – Turkey? Egypt? Chile? – and exactly how deeply the democratic impulse is. How easy is it, for example, to point to a country and say “Well, they’re not really a democracy” or “Well, they haven’t been a democracy LONG enough for it really to take hold”. As always it’s all about where you draw the line. But generally speaking I’d say the author is right. A modern coup in a democratic state is highly unlikely (and the results are probably short lived before democracy comes back).

The second scenario is Catastrophe. When nasty substances hit fans there can be little time or little incentive to vote on the response. But, if history tells us anything is that people still vote in even the direst times. After all we voted in BOTH World Wars, we’ve voted in global recessions and global pandemics and I think it would take a LOT for elections to be postponed or shelved for the length of any emergency. The only way that I think something like that could happen would be after a truly MAJOR catastrophe – like a nuclear war or large asteroid strike – in other words something that was an existential threat. But even in those cases, as long as we survive as a species or functioning society/civilisation, any suspension of the democratic process would most probably be a temporary one. Again if people have any great investment in a state they will inevitably want a say and an influence in how that state is run and how it affects their lives. I doubt if a non-democratic state could last long in these circumstances.

The third scenario is Technological Takeover. By this the author doesn’t mean the advent of Terminator style machines eliminating the electorate on mass but the subversion of electorates by the mega tech companies like Facebook, Google and their cohorts. If people can be convinced to ‘express themselves’ through Likes and re-tweets rather than actually voting for real people who have actual real policies then democracy could be undermined to an extent that people stop caring, stop bothering to vote or taking much interest in politics outside their own particular micro-bubbles online. Flame wars and Twitter storms might be an amusing way to pass time during a boring meeting but democracy it isn’t. Until recently I would’ve said that this was a much more likely outcome than the first two. But events, not just in the present US election but across the world, have made me more confident that people just won’t settle for a quick tweet or an Instagram post and feel like they’ve done ‘their part’ or even achieved anything. People are still willing and able to put their phones down long enough to make some badly written signs and get out there and protest. It’s even likely, I suggest, that technology can actually strengthen and deepen democracies as we move beyond a simple candidate vote every 4-5 years to secure local or national referendums on a whole host of issues that can be tallied almost instantly – and publically – to test the temperature of the larger electorate.

The last scenario is if Something Better comes along. Some, like Nick Land, propose a kind of national corporation where ex-citizens become little more than customers for products, services and anything else that is presently provided for by government. We would, in effect, ‘vote’ by using our choices and purchase power. Of course there is a real alternative to democracy right now on the opposite side of the world – China. Could that be the future just around the corner for the rest of us? Maybe. Pragmatic 21^st century Authoritarianism, like we are beginning to see in some unexpected places, might be what enough people want without the burden of political activity or conflict. Could we instead move towards as Epistocracy – a system based on knowledge rather than citizenship? Or an Aristocracy – in the Greek sense – a society run by ‘the best’ for the rest of us (how you choose ‘the best’ is a whole other issue of course!). Certainly Liberal Democracy isn’t necessarily part of the fabled ‘End of History’.

Overall this was an interesting work, full of interesting ideas to think about. Personally I don’t think Democracy is going anywhere – certainly not to its end point – any time soon. It might possibly be middle-aged but it’s certainly not in its dotage. Is Democracy the final stage of politics? Probably not. It’s possible that Democracy is simply part of an eternal cycle moving to Oligarchy, Tyranny and back to Democracy again. Or maybe we’ll come up with something better, maybe something no one has tried yet. A recommended read for all the political thinkers out there.