What’s Wrong with Spreading Democracy?

This chapter provides several arguments against the policy of spreading liberal democracy, starting with Immanuel Kant’s conviction that a global federation of democratic republics can bring an end to war. Despite a few good points, Kant’s vision is deeply flawed. Besides, democracy does not necessarily yield liberty. Furthermore, it cannot be taken for granted that American values are universal. Moreover, American liberalism and American democracy are not healthy or robust enough to be amenable to transplantation. American liberalism is suffering from self-inflicted wounds, resulting from the influence of postmodernism (a.k.a., woke liberalism). As to democracy, the socialist liberalism (i.e., New Deal liberalism) that emerged after the world wars of the twentieth century has, since the era Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, given way to a neoliberalism whose aversion to modest socialist policies has created obscene levels of inequality. As a result, America’s effort to spread liberal democracy has turned the world into a global oligarchy in her own image.