Similar expectations in Washington and among Western politicians and intellectuals—that the so-called Arab Spring would end up looking like a rerun of the 1989 political spring in central and eastern Europe and usher in an era of a New Peace in the Middle East—proved to be wishful thinking. These movements have actually helped strengthen political forces that are opposed to the principles embodied in the Enlightenment project, including religious freedom and women's rights. The Muslim world is not being feminized.
China and India also provide interesting case studies in examining Pinker's thesis and the notion that liberal democracy is on the rise. China has embraced its unique form of capitalism in order to create wealth. But contrary to the expectations raised by Thomas Friedman, it has failed to create pressure in support of liberal democracy.
And while it is true that India does hold free elections and has a few impressive commercial centers, it still remains a society divided by membership in castes. The recent gang rape of a young woman there exposed a sociocultural reality where, according to a 2012 UNICEF opinion poll, 57 percent of male adolescents and 53 percent of female adolescents believe that a husband has the right to beat up his wife under certain conditions.
It would be an intellectual overreach to argue that the West (or the North as opposed to the South) is a unified political entity (or for that matter, to overlook political divisions inside Western nations). Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Turkey and Israel are imperfect liberal democracies (as is Greece). Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia and some of the developed nations in Latin America have the attributes needed to move in that direction. The United States and its allies should respond to these changes through diplomacy and trade relationships, including by offering new liberal democracies membership in regional groups such as the EU.
But the time has come to recognize that the principles of liberal democracy are not universal. They are embedded in unique historical and cultural conditions and cannot be pressed on other national societies that are not ready and perhaps not even interested in adopting them. Instead of embracing a futile and counterproductive mission of making the world safe for democracy, the American people and their leaders should contribute to the Enlightenment project by applying and perfecting its principles at home.
Leon Hadar, senior analyst at Wikistrat, a geostrategic consulting group, is the author of Sandstorm: Policy Failure in the Middle East.
Comments
If Hadar has well outlined the reasons why being arrogant about trying to impose "our" "ideas" on others won't work and is harmful to us the funny aspect of it is how incoherent those ideas are particularly in the minds of those with the most programmatic ideas of claiming them as "ours" and trying to impose them elsewhere.One just has to laugh, that is, at seeing these same cultural imperialists insisting that others behave like us, turning to talk about domestic matters whereupon they become instant and sanctimonious "multiculturalists" denouncing any and all ideas—almost no matter how organic and fundamental–that we all *here* adhere to the same behavior and abide by the same values. A mighty-funny concept, their brand of "multi-culturalism." Rather plastic, flexible and conveniently employable.