This week’s session examined the apparently counter-intuitive concept of illiberal democracy using the case study of illiberal democracy in post-conflict Angola. The first half of the session focused on a discussion of the concepts of liberalism, illiberalism, democracy, autocracy and various combinations of the different terms. This session provided the perfect opportunity to explore my musings on whether liberalism really creates the environment for the ideal society that it portrays to, including by writers such as Roland Paris who has claimed that there is no viable society outside some form of Liberal society.
As highlighted during the lecture, the basic definitions of constitutional liberalism in the academic literature highlight that a society which provides for and protects rights of citizens can be classed as a liberal society. But as this week revealed, in practice this proves to be an extremely subjective and often contentious conceptualisation. Despite the fact that this is the minimalist definition, functionally a liberal society features not only the protection of basic liberties of speech, assembly, religion and property, but free and fair elections and the separation of powers. As highlighted in the lecture and associated readings, this is a definition, which is consistent with the western tradition in which the concept of liberalism has grown up.
Given this tradition it makes sense to me that accordingly, the contextual roots of the concept can’t be ignored when we examine the way in which countries are classed as ‘Liberal’ and ‘Illiberal’. And the risks, as we classify Liberal and Illiberal and promote a Liberal agenda, include a danger of classifying countries according to how well they look like a western normative idea of ideal society. This character becomes, in this way, a prescription for an ideal society at which point peace building processes, can overshoot their mandate. Scholars such as Laila Abu Lughod have warned us of the dangers of this.
But there are other dangers to this approach. I certainly do agree with a number of liberal precepts in terms of their need for, in particular, an accountable state. But the confusion of terms such as ‘liberal’ and ‘democracy’ in discourse, policy and practice,as being necessarily synonymous has also, from what I’ve observed this week, led to confusion of what these ideas can achieve. Looking specifically at democracy, Zakaria explained that democracy is often necessarily associated with Liberal democracy hence, the difficulty and counter-intuitiveness of Illiberal democracy in a country such as Angola, which holds regular election but in which the well-being of citizens as a whole appears not to be a priority for the government’s agenda. As demonstrated in Angola democracy doesn’t guarantee constitutional liberalism, since local elites have managed post war -reconstruction in defiance of liberal precepts including the expansion of economic freedoms and poverty alleviation for the majority of the population.
The case of Angola seems to reveal an approach relating to post –conflict reconstruction, where policy makers and academics have focused on it exceptionally as flawed, built on underlying assumptions (of democracy as necessarily liberal democracy) which are fallacious. And this is an issue because it doesn’t result in better outcomes for the citizens of the country in which intervention is taking place. Sure, I’ve drawn attention to the problems with the highly prescriptive (in normative terms) character of Liberalism. But as someone who does believe in the development as capabilities and freedoms, the lack of even basic capabilities is indeed, to me a problem.
So what?
So where does that leave me? A cynic of Liberalism? A cynic of Democracy? Desiring to abandon the ‘development’ agenda altogether à la Escobar?
No, not quite.
Firstly, it is inevitable that any theory when written reflects, as highlighted by da Silva, who the writer is. Accordingly there were inevitably certain understandings of liberalism at its inception, which have necessarily informed the application of the concept as it has grown up.
It is, what it is. And while I think that it is extremely important to be aware of and interrogate these understandings when applying them to different contexts, I don’t see this as necessarily a bad thing.
But, relating these considerations to the issue that is still the main source of my discomfort here: in practice this discussion becomes exceptionally pertinent when relating to external, international interventions in state and peace building. How do you (re)build states without simply creating (unstable) prototypes based on a ‘Western Ideal’? How do you respect the cultural sensitivities of people within particular country contexts, without leaving them as victims to real and genuine oppression?
As yet my thoughts on this topic have reached an inconclusive end, however as suggested by Raquel da Silva, perhaps the focus should be on giving people the knowledge that alternative options and ways of living are possible and then allowing them the freedom to choose their preferred way.
I can’t help but think that she may just be on to something.
Some Sources
- Abu-Lughod, L. (2002) Do Muslim women really need saving?
- De Oliveira, R. S. (2011) Illiberal peacebuilding in Angola, Journal of Modern African Studies 49(2), pp. 287-314
- Paris, R. (2010) ‘Saving liberal peacebuilding’, Review of International Studies 36 (2)
- Schmitter, P. (1995), More Liberal, Preliberal, or Postliberal?, Journal of Democracy, 6(1)
- Sen, A. (2001) Development as Freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford
- Zakaria, F. (1997) The rise of illiberal democracy, Foreign Affairs 76(6),
The Narrator's Pen 