Was Democracy Just A Moment?
Was Democracy Just A Moment?
This is the title of a 1997(!) Atlantic piece by Robert Kaplan, the foreign correspondent and advisor to various elements of US defense and foreign affairs institutions. I have long recommended the piece as a warning against American complacency about the health of our own democracy, and the futility of promoting democracy in places without the cultural means to sustain it - Russia and China being prime examples. Again, strongly recommended -
Robert Kaplan. Was Democracy Just A Moment? Atlantic Magazine, December, 1997.
The global triumph of democracy was to be the glorious climax of the American Century. But democracy may not be the system that will best serve the world—or even the one that will prevail in places that now consider themselves bastions of freedom.