The old democratic order is fading away. Declining birthrates, persistent high unemployment, unassimilated immigrant populations, youth crime and anti-social behavior, transnational terrorism, the insolvency of government-run entitlements, inflation and the erosion of the nation-state and national identity are the major problems confronting the old powers. As the democratic world searches for answers, three rival philosophies have begun to emerge.
Classical liberal nationalism is on the rise in the United Kingdom. As the Conservative Party under David Cameron continues to alienate its natural constituency in Middle England, the U.K. Independence Party emerges as a credible political challenger. Independence Party ideology is based on the premise that there are certain values that define the British nation and can only be protected and ensured by a sovereign and independent United Kingdom that represents it own interests. They believe tolerance, respect for human rights, the rule of law and protection of Britain’s unique institutions is the way to social order, stability and improvement. They are for equality, sovereignty, democratic accountability and are opposed to Islamic radicalism, Marxist radicalism, a government that plays off one group in a society against another. They want immigrants to assimilate and Britain to leave the European Union.
The Independence Party threatens the right by standing up for traditional “Britishness,” and it threatens the left by standing up for the average Briton who feels left behind by an internationalist and self-absorbed Labour Party. In other words, the Independence Party offers a new political direction without the usually fantastical myth-making or historical whitewashing.
The French National Front and the Japanese Restoration Party offer an alternative approach. These parties stress old-fashioned nationalism and assertiveness, and they promote the feeling that their countries have been “sold out” by their elites. In Japan, the Japanese Restoration Party leadership has raised eyebrows by both using government offices to purchase islands that are disputed with China – although it is fair to note that Japan has a much stronger claim – and at one point, stating that what Japan needed was a “dictator.” The Japanese Restoration Party did surprisingly well in the 2012 elections, which was its first appearance on a ballot.
In France, the National Front has done well in the recent election due to its hard line on Islamism and immigration, but it has a disturbing association with fascism, and Nazism in particular, that its current leader, Marie Le Pen, has worked hard to exorcize. However, the National Front also features a strain of thought that is skeptical of the French Revolution of 1789 and questions whether it actually benefited France. Both Japan and France offer examples of the continued appeal of late 19th and early 20th century nationalist populism.
The most successful new way in a democracy has by the Turkish Justice and Development Party, or AK Party. The AK Party, which has governed Turkey since 2002, can boast that under their leadership Turkey has undergone a cultural transformation while becoming the fastest growing economy in Europe. The AK Party is an Islamist organization that desires a return the Turkish Islamic pre-eminence of the Ottoman Empire. The party has promoted Islamic culture openly and led to a re-emergence of popular religion on the Turkish youth. It has done so by appealing to centuries-old tradition and the legacy of their Ottoman forbears, combined with technocratic know-how that has kept the economy moving and leaving the European Union countries in the dust. The party has stoked nationalism by confronting Syria and flexed its Islamic bona fides by provoking and then diplomatically outmaneuvering Israel during the Flotilla incident. During the Arab Spring revolutions, aspiring Islamists have held the AK Party up as the standard of 21st century Islamic political success and emulation.
With these three rival strains of political divergence, it is clear that in much of the “free” world people are looking for alternatives to the old order. In the United States, however, the tired old orthodoxies of left-right or Democrat-Republican still hold sway.
Both parties’ leadership continues to subscribe to the myth of progress that has produced such fantastical ideas from the “end of history” to the “New World Order” and the European Union – all of them abysmal failures.
The United States has always garnered legitimacy by being better than the alternatives. In the future, the U.S. may need to work harder to make that claim. America’s inflationary and insolvency troubles cannot be wished away, and the two parties will eventually have to part with sacred cows if the situation is to be salvaged.
Further, the American path is yet to be determined. A new movement could spring up in the United States that galvanizes the youth and provokes older citizens to part with the current incompetent leadership. But as other peoples begin to chart their own course and challenge the prevailing wisdom, do Americans risk being left behind if they do not tire of being badly led?
