cracy, by necessity, is rooted in ethnic and cultural separations, and that "Any sort of popular sovereignty [In the Middle east] has tended to unleash the furies and drive minorities into exile." I don't agree entirely with the author's conclusion, that there will be significant conflict and religious division in the next few years before a true Egyptian democracy emerges, but what really interested me in the article was the basic idea that democracy can cause civil strife.
The root cause of the conflict described in the article is an anti-Christian sentiment present in Egyptian society. It is not necessarily a common sentiment, and there are stories of Muslims demonstrating in solidarity with the Christians. However, it is one that is certainly present, and which has existed since long before Mubarak's fall. The advent of democracy, however allowed that sentiment to be expressed openly and acted upon.
Democracy, by its nature, is a political system which tends
to encourage anyone to speak their minds. This leads to both good speech and bad
speech. When you encourage everyone to speak out, some will
spread destructive messages. We have
been discussing similar free speech issues in class as well; When
does free speech become a harm to society? Egypt is an example of how allowing
everyone to voice their opinion can have negative consequences. I'm not saying
that free speech, or the accompanying democracy is a bad thing. It is just that
we have a tendency to view democracy as the perfect solution to the troubles of
a country. Although democracy (or technically democratic republics) may be the
best form of government so far, the conditions necessary for a healthy
democracy can cause their own set of problems.
Article:http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/16/opinion/sunday/douthat-democracys-collateral-damage.html
Image Credit: New York Times
Joe,
ReplyDeleteAn ambitious attempt to connect what is going on in the Arab Spring to something we're studying in class. I don't know if it quite works since we are looking at different points of crisis in American history and in Egypt we see a country emerging from a brutal dictatorship.
Perhaps an additional link to include would be an American policymaker like Hillary Clinton (or others) preaching the benefits of democracy to the Egyptians.