this post was submitted on 17 May 2025
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When is authoritarianism appropriate and when is it not?

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[โ€“] comfy@lemmy.ml 3 points 6 days ago

Democracy is not automatically "good". Democracy is a tool. When applied in an appropriate way and to an appropriate voter base (one informed and smart enough to, on average, make a correct vote), it's a great decision-making tool. It also has the ability to empower a larger number of people, which has real tangible benefits. When applied in an inappropriate way... well just look around. Most liberal democracies have just become a pay-to-win competition for the mega-rich to launder their dictatorship though.

I say this as someone who has designed and run democratic projects, and someone who is generally pro-democracy, yet against most existing "democratic countries".

It's also important to note historical cases like the 1917 October Revolution, where there became an interesting question of whether a liberal democracy was more important than putting power in the hands of the working class - the second option was closer to the goals of an ideal democracy, despite appearing to be an anti-democratic authoritarian seizure of power. Consider alternative cases, like democracies which have allowed right-wing authoritarians to legally gain large amounts of power (e.g. Hitler, Trump) and whether it was more important to preserve a malfunctioning liberal democracy or to prevent a harmful regime taking over.