24 August 2008
Democracy Is Not an Implicit Right
In their article on American Interest Online, “The Right Side of the Law,” Peter Ackerman and Michael J. Glennon attempt to justify non-violent intervention in the political affairs of other nations when the motive is to weaken authoritarian rule. They seem to assume that “Jeffersonian Democracy” will naturally emerge in the ensuing power vacuum.
While the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was correct to denote as implicit the right of men to participate in their government, it was a victim of its times to designate free and fair elections as the only permitted vehicle for that participation. (Besides, many of the states that have signed the Declaration are governed, no doubt, by virtually authoritarian regimes.) The advance of information technology has made archaic participation through the election of representatives. It has become possible for an autocratic regime to anticipate the desires of the public, through intelligent use of polling, communications monitoring, even direct solicitation of preferences, and to govern freely while securing the welfare of the general populace.
Whether states have the right to engage in democracy promotion around the world is an entirely separate question. It is incorrect to justify non-violent intervention by claiming that the adoption of the intervening agency’s prescriptions serves the general public benefit. Human rights may require that information be freely available from foreign evangelists of democracy, not that the host nation adopt their principles of government. The host nationals may freely prefer abdicating responsibility for governance to a benevolent dictator.
Mr. Ackerman and Mr. Glennon make a strong argument for allowing foundations such as Freedom House to support advocates for democratic change in authoritarian regimes around the world. Nevertheless, they do not convince us that social systems that produce such advocates are the best ones for everyone to live in. Nor is the emergence of many electoral democracies over the last twenty years sufficient to establish as illegal under human rights law an alternative system of civil order that fulfills its people’s aspirations.
In their article on American Interest Online, “The Right Side of the Law,” Peter Ackerman and Michael J. Glennon attempt to justify non-violent intervention in the political affairs of other nations when the motive is to weaken authoritarian rule. They seem to assume that “Jeffersonian Democracy” will naturally emerge in the ensuing power vacuum.
While the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was correct to denote as implicit the right of men to participate in their government, it was a victim of its times to designate free and fair elections as the only permitted vehicle for that participation. (Besides, many of the states that have signed the Declaration are governed, no doubt, by virtually authoritarian regimes.) The advance of information technology has made archaic participation through the election of representatives. It has become possible for an autocratic regime to anticipate the desires of the public, through intelligent use of polling, communications monitoring, even direct solicitation of preferences, and to govern freely while securing the welfare of the general populace.
Whether states have the right to engage in democracy promotion around the world is an entirely separate question. It is incorrect to justify non-violent intervention by claiming that the adoption of the intervening agency’s prescriptions serves the general public benefit. Human rights may require that information be freely available from foreign evangelists of democracy, not that the host nation adopt their principles of government. The host nationals may freely prefer abdicating responsibility for governance to a benevolent dictator.
Mr. Ackerman and Mr. Glennon make a strong argument for allowing foundations such as Freedom House to support advocates for democratic change in authoritarian regimes around the world. Nevertheless, they do not convince us that social systems that produce such advocates are the best ones for everyone to live in. Nor is the emergence of many electoral democracies over the last twenty years sufficient to establish as illegal under human rights law an alternative system of civil order that fulfills its people’s aspirations.
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