Western Liberal Democracy: Tensions Remain

If American politics post-2016 has been suffused with concerns about a crisis of “liberalism,” the past few weeks have seen a sudden shift among much of the commentariat: a democratic spring, in which regime alternatives to democracy have faced major challenges.

Richard Hanania in a recent Substack post offers a triumphalist example of this trend: The year 2022 has proven Francis Fukuyama right. History is still over. Characterized by paranoia and a seemingly indefinite series of lockdowns, the response of the People’s Republic of China to Covid has both slowed the Chinese economy and discredited Beijing’s hyper-technocratic approach to politics. Facing setback after setback in his invasion of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has at once galvanized a transatlantic alliance and raised doubts about the viability of his effort to create a Russian counterweight to Western democracies.

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Fred Bauer

Fred Bauer is a writer from New England.

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If American politics post-2016 has been suffused with concerns about a crisis of “liberalism,” the past few weeks have seen a sudden shift among much of the commentariat: a democratic spring, in which regime alternatives to democracy have faced major challenges.

Richard Hanania in a recent Substack post offers a triumphalist example of this trend: The year 2022 has proven Francis Fukuyama right. History is still over. Characterized by paranoia and a seemingly indefinite series of lockdowns, the response of the People’s Republic of China to Covid has both slowed the Chinese economy and discredited Beijing’s hyper-technocratic approach to politics. Facing setback after setback in his invasion of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has at once galvanized a transatlantic alliance and raised doubts about the viability of his effort to create a Russian counterweight to Western democracies.