The Strongman Fantasy
And Dictatorship in Real Life
MAR 17, 2024
Quite a few Americans
like the idea of strongman rule. Why not a dictator who will get things
done?
I lived in eastern Europe when memories of communism were
fresh. I have visited regions in Ukraine where Russia imposed its
occupation regime. I have spent decades reading testimonies of people who
lived under Nazi or Stalinist rule. I have seen
death pits, some old, some freshly dug. And I have friends who have lived under
authoritarian regimes, including political prisoners and survivors of torture.
Some of the people I trusted most have been assassinated.
So I think that there is
an answer to this question.
Strongman rule is a fantasy. Essential to it is the idea
that a strongman will be your strongman. He
won't. In a democracy, elected representatives listen to
constituents. We take this for granted, and imagine that a dictator would
owe us something. But the vote you cast for him affirms your
irrelevance. The whole point is that the strongman owes us nothing.
We get abused and we get used to it.
Another pleasant illusion is that the strongman
will unite the nation. But an
aspiring dictator will always claim that some belong and others don't. He
will define one group after another as the enemy. This might feel good,
so long as you feel that you are on the right side of the line. But now
fear is the essence of life. The politics of us-and-them, once begun,
never ends.
We dream that a
strongman will let us focus on America. But dictatorship opens our
country to the worst the world has to offer. An American strongman will
measure himself by the wealth and power of other dictators. He will
befriend them and compete with them. From them he will learn new ways to
oppress and to exploit his own people.
At least, the fantasy
goes, the strongman will get things done. But dictatorial power today is
not about achieving anything positive. It is about preventing anyone else
from achieving anything. The strongman is really the weak man: his secret
is that he makes everyone else weaker.
Unaccountable to the law
and to voters, the dictator has no reason to consider anything beyond his own
personal interests. In the twenty-first century, those are simple: dying
in bed as a billionaire. To enrich himself and to stay out of prison, the
strongman dismantles the justice system and replaces civil servants with
loyalists.
The new bureaucrats will
have no sense of accountability. Basic government functions will break
down. Citizens who want access will learn to pay bribes. Bureaucrats in
office thanks to patronage will be corrupt, and citizens will be desperate.
Quickly the corruption becomes normal, even unquestioned.
As the fantasy of strongman rule fades into everyday dictatorship, people realize that they need things like water or schools or Social Security checks. Insofar as such goods are available under a dictatorship, they come with a moral as well as a financial price. When you go to a government office, you will be expected to declare your personal loyalty to the strongman.
If you have a complaint
about these practices, too bad. Americans are litigious people, and many
of us assume that we can go to the police or sue. But when you vote a
strong man in, you vote out the rule of law. In court, only loyalism and
wealth will matter. Americans who do not fear the police will learn to do
so. Those who wear the uniform must either resign or become the enforcers
of the whims of one man.
Everybody (except the
dictator and his family and friends) gets poorer. The market system
depends upon competition. Under a strongman, there will be no such
thing. The strongman's clan will be favored by government. Our
wealth inequality, bad enough already, will get worse. Anyone hoping for
prosperity will have to seek the patronage of the official
oligarchs. Running a small business will become impossible. As soon
as you achieve any sort of success, someone who wants your business denounces
you.
In the fantasy of the
strongman, politics vanishes and all is clear and bright. In fact, a
dreary politics penetrates everything. You can't run a business without
the threat of denunciation. You can't get basic services without humiliation.
You feel bad about yourself. You think about what you say, since it can
be used against you later. What you do on the internet is recorded
forever, and can land you in prison.
Public space closes down
around you. You cannot escape to the bar or the bowling alley, since
everything you say is monitored. The person on the next stool or in the
next lane might not turn you in, but you have to assume they will. If you
have a t-shirt or a bumper sticker with a message, someone will report
you. Even if you just repeat the dictator's words, someone can lie about
you and denounce you. And then, if you voted for the strongman, you will
be confused. But you should not be. This is what you voted for.
Denunciation becomes
normal behavior. Without law and voting, denouncing others helps people
to feel safe. Under strongman rule, you cannot trust your colleagues or
your friends or even your family. Political fear not only takes away all
public space; it also corrupts all private relationships. And soon it
consumes your thoughts. If you cannot say what you think, you lose track
of what you believe. You cease to be yourself.
If you have a heart attack and go to the hospital, you have to
worry that your name is on a list. Care of elderly parents is suddenly in
jeopardy. That hospital bed or place in a retirement home is no longer
assured. If you draw attention to yourself, aged relatives will be dumped
in the street. This is not how America works now, but it is how
authoritarian regimes always work.
In the strongman
fantasy, no one thinks about children. But fear around children is the
essence of dictatorial power. Even courageous people restrain themselves
to protect their children. Parents know that children can be singled out
and beaten up. If parents step out of line, children lose any chance of
going to university, or lose their jobs.
Schools collapse anyway,
since a dictator only wants myths that justify his power. Children learn
in school to denounce one another. Each coming generation must be more
tame and ignorant than the prior one. Time with young children stresses
parents. Either your children repeat propaganda and tell you things you
know are wrong, or you worry that they will find out what is right and get in
trouble.
In a dictatorship,
parents no longer say what they think to their children, because they fear that
their children will repeat it in public. And once parents no longer speak
their minds at home, they can no longer create a trusting family. Even
parents who give up on honesty have to fear that their children will one day
learn the truth, take action, and get imprisoned.
Once this process
begins, it is hard to stop. At the present stage of the strongman
fantasy, people imagine an exciting experiment. If they don't like
strongman rule, they think, they can just elect someone else the next
time. This misses the point. If you help a strongman come to power,
you are eliminating democracy. You burn that bridge behind you. The
strongman fantasy dissolves, and real dictatorship remains.
Most likely you won’t be
killed or be required to kill. But amid the dreariness of life under
dictatorship is dark responsibility for others’ death. By the time the killing
starts, you will know that it is not about unity, or the nation, or getting
things done. The best Americans, betrayed by you when you cast your vote, will
be murdered at the whim and for the wealth of a dictator. Your tragedy will be
living long enough to understand this.
