Zack Beauchamp, coming back from months of looking how autocrats lose, writes a really fascinating piece in stopping fascism before it usurps democracy. Places like Brazil, South Korea, and Poland identified threats to their self-governance and democracy. They all defeated would be autocrats. But how? Autocrats deeply care about democratic facade and work very hard to appear to be democratic, including popular support.
This argument for strategic moderation raises a question: Why do would-be dictators care so much about having a pretext? If Chávez wanted to seize power, why didn’t he just do it?
Because when they do, Gamboa notes, the backlash is overwhelming. She cites, as one example, Peruvian President Pedro Castillo’s 2022 declaration of a state of emergency. The move was so obviously authoritarian that it galvanized Peruvians, and the international community, to act — leading to Castillo’s impeachment and arrest on the very same day as his attempted power grab.
Smart authoritarians, Gamboa notes, “have learned that they can avoid this kind of backlash and maintain a democratic facade by undermining democracy gradually instead.”
But if enough people see through the facade, the fact the regime is fascistic or authoritarian, making legible to mainstream, creates a weakness that an opposition party can go after.
Virtually every expert on backsliding has observed that would-be authoritarians value a democratic facade. But too few appreciate the implication: that autocrats have good reason to believe their project will fail if too many people see it as authoritarian, creating a point of vulnerability their opponents can exploit.
Beauchamp goes on to say that our modern day tyrants burn a lot calories and spend a lot time actively trying to convince their supporters that they are playing by the rules. This has important implications. If keeping up a facade is so important, that would mean that people really care about living under a democracy.
But I think the government’s success at building and maintaining a democratic facade is one of the most important factors, simply because many people genuinely care about preserving democracy.
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But the legibility of the threat matters much more than most people give it credit for, and it has played a decisive role in some of the biggest cases of democratic resilience in recent memory.
This is a must read piece and we have a chance to cancel the fascist takeover of this 250 year old republic.