Экзаменационнй писменный перевод

для студентов дневной формы обучения 2 курса направления подготовки – Политология

I variant

Democracy, extremism and War on Terror; people losing rights

Fear, scare stories and political opportunism

The use of fear in a democratic society is a well known tactic that undermines democracy.

For example, the US has also been widely criticized for using the War on Terror to cut back on various freedoms in the US, and often undermining democracy and related principles. By raising fears of another terrorist attack it has been easy to pass through harsher policies ranging from more stringent borders, to snooping on citizens in various ways.

Another example is the US military commissions act in 2006 which has increased already formidable presidential powers further, rolling back some key principles of justice such as habeas corpus (the traditional right of detainees to challenge their detention), allowing the President to detain anyone indefinitely while giving US officials immunity from prosecution for torturing detainees that were captured before the end of 2005 by US military and CIA. (It is also an example of how a seemingly non-democratic bill is passed in through a democratic system. The previous link goes into this in a lot more detail.)

Fear, scare stories and political opportunism have also been a useful propaganda tools during election time. For example, A November 6 Democracy Now! interview noted that the US government had long ago predetermined when the sentencing of Saddam Hussein would take place: conveniently just before the 2006 mid-term elections so as to try and get extra votes through the appearance of a successful action coming to a close.

II variant

Another example comes from the Iranian hostage crisis where Iranian students held some American hostages for over a year: A documentary that aired on a British cable channel (cannot recall details unfortunately) explained how Reagan, challenging Carter in the US presidential race, used a propaganda stunt that also helped him achieve popular support: Reagan and George H. W. Bush had struck a deal with the Iranian mullahs to provide weapons if they released the hostages the day after he was sworn in as President, rather than before, during Carter’s term.

This would allow Reagan to be sworn in with a very positive and triumphant view, and provide an image of him that could be used again and again in the future to help bolster him and his party, even though, as Robert Parry commented, “The American people must never be allowed to think that the Reagan-Bush era began with collusion between Republican operatives and Islamic terrorists, an act that many might view as treason.” [Robert Parry, The Bushes & the Truth About Iran, Consortium News, September 21, 2006]

Cynics will note (rightly) that such tactics are not new and they happen all the time. The problem is that many people (often cynics themselves) believe it, or importantly, believe it at that time. Because these things have happened throughout history does not automatically mean it should also happen in the future too.

Supposedly, society becomes more sophisticated and improves its knowledge of how these aspects work. We are supposed to be able to learn from past experiences, and if that were true, knowing that such things can happen, and yet they continue to do so all the time also signals a weakness or problem in the democratic institutions if such actions are not held accountable for they deceive the public into mis-informed decisions.

III variant

This is an overly complex situation as it goes to the heart of society and questions whether a society suffering this problem is truly democratic if systemically the mainstream media fails to hold those in power to account, either through fear of criticism that they are not being patriotic or through being part of the same elite establishment that reinforces each others views and perspectives, etc. The point is, perhaps regardless of whether this is easy to address or not, there may be a fundamental problem: not enough democracy, openness, transparency and accountability, thus letting these things happen, repeatedly.

Weak democracies and hostile oppositions

It seems that where democracies are weak (e.g. through government corruption, favoritism, or incompetence, or just because a nation is newly emerging, or only recently moving out of dictatorship and towards democracy) there is a greater risk in the rise of hostile opposition.

Sundeep Waslekar is president of the Strategic Foresight Group, a respectable think tank from India. He captures these concerns describing how this can pave the way for extremism:

Bangladesh has terrorist groups belonging to Islamist as well as leftist ideologies. They gathered strength in the late 1990s in a political vacuum created by constant infighting between the principal leaders of the democratic politics. The situation in Bangladesh is similar to that in Nepal, which had autocratic rule in one form or another until 1991. With the induction of democracy in 1991, it was hoped that the voiceless would now have a space to press for their priorities. However, those in power, in partnership with their capitalist cronies, concentrated on the development of the capital region. They also engaged in such a bitter fight with one another that democracy was discredited as a reliable institution, creating a void that was quickly filled by extremists. In the case of Nepal, the Maoists stepped in. In the case of Bangladesh, it was the extremists of the left and the religious right. Having tested popular support, they have developed a vested interest in their own perpetuation. The result is that the Nepali political parties have had to accept an arrangement with the Maoists while the Bangladeshi political parties are courting Islamic extremists.