Liberty at risk as threats to freedom grow. By Historian Peter Frankopan
Liberty at risk as threats to freedom grow
NOVEMBER 4, 2022
BY: PETER FRANKOPAN
Engelsberg Ideas
Non-western elites are redefining freedom on their own terms, as sovereignty, state security and stability. But the world becoming a lot less free should concern us all.
… We are living in a post-Enlightenment age, where powers are progressively being harvested by leaders with autocratic tendencies and authoritarian political structures, who present themselves as guardians of their citizens’ interests, in much the same way as medieval kings did.
That is self-evident in countries such as Russia, China, Turkey, Hungary and others, where the apparatus of the state, as well as the media, is either in government or friendly hands. It is increasingly true in liberal democracies, too, however, where chaotic domestic politics — from the merry-go-round in Britain to the 6 January 2021 storming of the Capitol in Washington — suggest there are serious problems in states that have long prided themselves on being stable, and able to avoid the personality cults that characterise autocratic rule.
It is hard to predict the impact on freedom of current economic pressures — with the financial implications of the pandemic dovetailing with inflationary headwinds, the exclusion of Russia from many international markets, sudden shifts by central banks to change money supply, and climatic stresses.
Historians, however, would point to the past to underline the strong correlation between downturns and reduced freedoms. What the coming years and decades have to offer is unclear. But few would bet that our world will be freer than it has been for the past 30 years, and a wiser gambler would put money on the chances that the opposite trend — of restrictions, exclusions, centralisation of power — will rise sharply. That prospect should concern us all.
Much more here.
https://engelsbergideas.com/essays/liberty-at-risk-as-threats-to-freedom-grow/
= new reply since forum marked as read
