"The death of 1989"

It's the not the return of the Cold War, not by a long shot. But the wave of democratization, market opening, and globalization that began at the end of 1970s is definitely over. It reached its peak in 1989, with the fall of the Soviet bloc, but continued until the end of the 1990s, with the fall of Milosevic in 2000. But the last eight years have seen a strong reversal of the trend, which goes to show: positive trends can draw on powerful forces, but positive outcomes are far from inevitable. They require sound policies, leadership, and persistence. They're not part of some automatic unfolding of history.*

There's no ideology or coherent political system that ties these resurgent anti-liberal countries together. They're simply autocracies that learned to adapt and avoid the fate of, say, the Soviet Union, Serbia, or Iraq. (What's happening now in Georgia is best thought of as a cousin of what happened in Yugoslavia in the 1990s -- except the analogue of Serbia, Russia, is winning.) The most sophisticated of these autocracies have learned to smooth-talk their way with skillful twisting of Western concepts and language. Having nuclear weapons helps. But the main common factor among all of them is state monopoly control of increasingly valuable oil and natural gas resources. Already familiar from the corrupt petro-dictatorships of the Middle East, Venezuela, and west Africa, such countries feature the "strong state, weak society" model. The government frees itself from dependency on tax revenue by seizing control of valuable natural resources sold mainly to foreigners. Most other valuable economic activity is controlled by the state as well, not motivated by socialist ideologies, but by simple cronyism and gangsterism. The rest of society and economy go into sharp decline. Russia, in many respects, is the most advanced case of these trends.

We won't be hearing talk of "World War V," I hope. But the common denominator of energy monopoly in a world of sharply rising demand for energy will, I expect, stimulate energy-consuming countries to develop a common strategy to moderate demand and look for alternatives to fossil fuels exported from the petro-dictatorships. Such a strategy is certainly overdue. We also need to step back from our casually reckless adherence to the globalization paradigm and concentrate on repair and defense of existing democracies.

And one more point: the progress and retreat of political democratization, social and economic liberalization, and globalization go hand in hand, contrary to a certain piece of fashionable claptrap now making the rounds on the left.

POSTSCRIPT: Some fine reporting, as always, from Michael Totten. Also, thoughts from Paul Berman, who has rightly declared the "death of 1989."
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* The developments of the last decade have discredited not only the naive arguments of economic determinists (prosperity leads automatically to political liberalization), but the European post-historical fantasy of "soft power." The "end of history" has, well, ended. It didn't die all at once, but in stages: the rise of al Qa'eda and the 9/11 attacks, the return of Russia and China as great powers, the sharp rise in commodity prices, and so on.

Good czar, bad czar

Something very bad has happened in Russia in the last eight years: the rise of Vladimir Putin and the new Russian mafia state. Contrary to myths still repeated in the West, this period has not seen Russia become more stable or a nicer place: on the contrary. The Russian state has prospered, because it's seized control of Russia's oil and gas wealth. It's now become another petro-dictatorship. The decline of Russian society, arrested in the 90s, is accelerating.

But there's also a whole army of bagmen (consultants, lobbyists, etc.) out there who've clouded the issue both here and especially in Europe. The West lacks the clarity on the issue that it had during the Cold War, even though Russia is causing problems in Iran and is about to in Kosovo. This is not the 90s "holiday from history" any more. And there's no good czar - Yeltsin - to deal with.

Bad - bad - czar - bad - bad.

The other eleventh day revisited

Here's an interesting article by Richard Rubin about America's last surviving Great War veterans (requires registration). What was it all about?

Just rediscovered: Michael Totten's prescient essay on Turkey, from several years ago. His point about the differences between Europe and America is well-taken: America has a big hammer and tends to think of everything as a nail. Europe ignores nails, even when staring at them. Europeans (not their governments, but their populations) overwhelmingly oppose Turkey's entrance into the EU, because it puts the border of Europe, not at the old Cold War line, but well into the Middle East. As Totten puts it, Turkey is a nail. And, as Yugoslavia proved, Europe lacks hammers.

Don't miss out on Totten's recent, superb reportage-essays from Kurdistan and Iran. His policy advice is deeply informed and worth more than most of the chatter in Western capitals. And I wish I could write like that.

More realism

The October issue of The American Spectator has a fine article by James Kurth on the chequered history of democratization in American foreign policy, from the post-Civil War South to Iraq. It's a well-written and thought-through piece by someone who clearly knows what he's talking about, from an essentially realist perspective.

Kurth doesn't poo-poo democratization. But he compares cases to illuminate why democratization fails or succeeds. The critical factors include previous liberal-democratic practices and large middle and working classes with a big vested interest in the rule of law, representative institutions, and nonviolent political change. The failure mode awaiting countries that don't have these factors is either ethnic break-up (like Yugoslavia, Lebanon, and Iraq) or populist democracy (rather than liberal democracy). The latter is what's happening in Russia and Venezuela: a one-man authoritarian system headed towards dictatorship with only vestiges of democratic practices. It's what happened to Italy in 1922-24, then Germany in 1930-33.

Unfortunately, the article is available on their Web site only to subscribers. But you can rush out to your local bookstore and buy it. You might scruple to avoid TAS as a right-wing rag, but enjoy Ben Stein if you can't enjoy the rest.