Adilscape: 2024

Introduction

With the collapse of the Soviet Union in late 1991, US political scientist Francis Fukuyama in his book The End of History and the Last Man (Citation1992) triumphantly declared that the event marked the universalisation of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government (Fukuyama Citation1992).

However, time has since mellowed the now septuagenarian Fukuyama, whose earlier writings made him an ideologue of neo-conservative thought. In his book, Liberalism and Its Discontents, he accepts that the war-like misadventures of neo-liberals and the race and gender-based Left-wing identity politics of US ‘progressives’ have increased inequality around the world and caused the perception that liberal ideas are outdated (Fukuyama Citation2022).

Fukuyama is not the only major Western political philosopher of our times to have made a grim assessment of the present so-called ‘Liberal International Order’ (LIO). Several eminent political scientists believe that liberal institutions established after the Second World War are currently facing major challenges.

For instance, noted American political scientist John Mearsheimer makes the extraordinary claim that the post-Cold War era of US-led liberal hegemony is definitively over and avers that it has given way to an ‘illiberal age’ (Mearscheimer Citation2018), characterised by a return to realist great-power competition (Carter Citation2022). Acclaimed British-American historian Niall Ferguson goes a step further by claiming that the so-called ‘LIO’ was largely an illusion devised for American power, which the Trump administration has simply exposed (Ferguson Citation2025). In his book, New Leviathans: Thoughts after Liberalism, British political philosopher John Gray grimly observes: ‘Enclaves of Liberalism persist, but a civilisation of liberal values, based on practices of tolerance, has passed into history’ (Gray Citation2023).

A recent indicator of the enormity of the crisis facing Liberalism is that the United States, often deemed to be the ‘first and foremost modern, liberal state’, is itself witnessing growing distrust from within its citizenry towards the performance of its liberal democratic institutions. According to a survey conducted by the reputed Pew Research Center, public trust in the US government is nearing an all-time low, with only 17 per cent trusting their government’s actions, with only 2 per cent believing the government acts rightly ‘just about always’, and only 15 per cent affirming that it acts correctly ‘most of the time’ (Pew Research Center Citation2025). Another study found that one in three Americans in 2024 declared that they would not accept the presidential election results of that year, if the opposing party candidate won (World Justice Project Citation2024).

The situation across the pond is not reassuring either. Across 12 high-income European democracies, median public satisfaction with democratic governance has fallen from 49 per cent in 2021 to 36 per cent in 2024 (Wike, Silver, and Castillo Citation2019). The title of the Pew Report, co-written by Richard Wike, Laura Silver and Alexandra Castillo, states: ‘Many across the globe are dissatisfied with how democracy is working: Discontent is tied to concerns about the economy, individual rights and out-of-touch elites’. For liberal scholars, there are growing concerns about rising public support for far-Right groups and nationalist parties, increasing levels of hostility towards immigrants and a general dislike towards liberal, secular values (Li et al. Citation2025).

The frequency of public protests over increasing disparity of income, downsizing of government, high energy prices, spiralling living costs and questionable immigration policy has risen in major Western cities (The Associated Press Citation2025); the most notable being the 2011 Occupy Wall Street protests in the United States, the 2018 Yellow Vest protests for economic justice in France, the 2020 US Capitol Hill Occupied protests in Washington, and the 2025 London March against the British government over its immigration policy (Yalahuzian et al. Citation2025).

Global liberal order in crisis

The LIO—also sometimes called the ‘Rules-Based Order’—came into existence in the late 1940s through the formation of some of the aforementioned global organisations, with the view to promote liberal values and democratic systems of governance around the world and to establish the principles of rule of law, the sovereign equality of States, protection for human rights, promotion of economic Liberalism and bolstering principled multilateralism and global governance (Lake, Martin, and Risse Citation2021).

In theory, the LIO applies rules to each country equally, who are encouraged to be democratic, open their respective economies to the rest of the world and uphold human rights as established in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1948.

Major global institutions have been established since the end of the Second World War that serve as the bedrock of the LIO, such as the United Nations Organisation (established in 1945), International Monetary Fund (established in 1944), the World Bank (established in 1944), World Health Organisation (established 1948), World Trade Organisation (1995), International Criminal Court (ICC), the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), etc. However, many of these institutions are currently facing crises of credibility and relevance (Trihart and Romier Citation2025), with many political philosophers expressing concerns over their efficacy and longevity (Colambato Citation2025).

These concerns have increased following the US’ withdrawal of support (particularly under the Trump administration) from several United Nations organisations and agreements (Li et al. Citation2025), such as the World Health Organisation (WHO), UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), etc (AJIL Al Citation2025). In fact, on 7 January 2026, President Donald Trump signed an Executive Order suspending US participation in 66 international organisations, including 31 UN agencies, marking a major retreat from global cooperation (Euro News, Citation2026).

The US has even imposed sanctions on the International Criminal Court (ICC) and has strained alliances and cut funding to the UN and NATO (Center of American Progress Citation2025). It has also withdrawn itself from the Paris Agreement and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) tax agreement (AJIL Al Citation2025). The US recently restricted United Nations Relief and Work Agency’s (UNRWA) role in distributing aid, despite UNRWA’s efforts to reform and its investigations into the activities of its staff (Al Jazeera Citation2025).

This essay posits that the apparent state of decline of liberal values and its international institutions in the 21st century is more an outcome of the liberal philosophy’s own internal contradictions (vacillating from ideals pursued by individualist classical Liberalism to collectivist social Liberalism, etc.) along with the decline in international support to ILO institutions and mechanisms, which poses a greater threat to Liberalism than any external challenge posed by totalitarian ideologies like communism, fascism or religious extremism.

In fact, an objective study of the evolution of Liberalism (both at the conceptual and political levels) over the span of roughly four centuries since its inception, in itself reveals the internal inconsistencies and dialectical anomalies that beset the liberal discourse to this day. In spite of its present state of decline, which scholars like John Gray fear might be irreversible, the discussion is meaningful, as perhaps Liberalism alone has the philosophical capacity to correct its course, which is essential for salvaging an increasingly fractious and interconnected global society.

Classical Liberalism: ‘state as necessary evil’

Liberalism is an idea sprung out of the revival of humanism during the Renaissance in Europe from the 14th century onwards, followed by the Age of Enlightenment (a European philosophical movement beginning in the 17th century).

To give a simple definition by Maurice Carlston, Liberalism is a social and political ‘philosophy that believes in liberty’ (Cranston Citation1967). As a political ideology it champions individual freedom, equality and justice. It believes in the free will of people, who it believes have the right to live the way they deem appropriate, as long as their choices do not harm others. It also emphasises freedom of speech, freedom of religion and ideology, and yet many of its proponents prefer reason, critical inquiry and evidence-based knowledge above blind faith, dogma and trite social and traditional norms.

For most of human history, rulers and emperors believed that their right to govern came directly from God, rather than from their subjects. However, the Age of Enlightenment in Europe produced thinkers from roughly the 17th centuries onwards, who questioned the divine right of kings and stressed on consent of the populace in matters of governance.

In addition, Liberalism gave importance to the individual above the collective (community or society) as the ideology posits that gifted individuals drive innovation, while collectivist institutions and communities are prone to follow a hide-bound, herd-like outlook, and remain tied to hackneyed norms, irrational dogma and trite social conventions. Thus, Liberalism lays stress on individual rights, autonomy, self-reliance and freedom. Most exponents of classical Liberalism extol equality of opportunity for all humans, as opposed to equality of outcome. In their view, non-conformist inventiveness of the individual needs to be nurtured as against collectivist mediocrity, which they believe thwarts free thinking and innovation.

In addition, classical Liberalism views government as a ‘necessary evil’ (a popular phrase derived from American revolutionary Paine’s Citation1776 pamphlet Common Sense and believes that although any form of government is undesirable because it restricts freedom, it is still necessary to prevent chaos and to protect fundamental human rights (mainly life, liberty and personal property). Thus, Liberalism advocates the role of the State and government to be limited to maintaining order.

All forms of Liberalism, even today, promote tolerance for a diversity of views and beliefs in any society or nation. Liberalism calls for willingness of the population to respect or accept behaviour or opinions different from its own and encourages it to accept new, justifiable ideas and concepts in order to advance human progress. In addition to the rights to life, liberty, private property, Liberalism also champions freedom of speech, the rule of law (wherein the sovereign is not above the law), tolerance for religious and ideological pluralism and a representative government. Thus, the aim of a liberal system is to establish a fair and open society where all people receive equal opportunities to succeed.

One of the earliest exponents of Liberalism was the English philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679), who introduced the famous ‘social contract theory’ in his famous work, Leviathan. Being an early liberal, Hobbes did not seek to curtail the powers of the king, yet he believed that a nation is formed not by divine will, but by individuals who rationally agree to form a government to escape the brutal ‘state of nature’. Thus, Hobbes made the individual the locus of his ideal political system and argued that governments derive their legitimacy and authority from the consent of the governed (Hobbes Citation1651).

However, it is the English philosopher John Locke (1632–1704) who fully developed the political philosophy of Liberalism and is often regarded the ‘father of Liberalism’ (Hirschmann Citation2009, 79). Unlike Hobbes, Locke was not in favour of bestowing absolute power to the ruler, and believed that revolution was justified when the sovereign failed to fulfil obligations of the ‘social contract’ between the ruler and the governed. Thus, he famously stated, ‘No one can be … subjected to political power of another without his own consent’ (Locke Citation1689).

It is noteworthy that Locke also advocated religious tolerance in a State by stressing that coercing religious uniformity might lead to more social disorder than by merely allowing diversity. Championing freedom of expression, the great English poet John Milton, in his 1644 prose polemic Aeropagitica, ardently advocated the importance of freedom of speech and called for ‘the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties’ (Milton Citation1644).

Classical liberals extended political and social liberty in the economic sphere, with Adam Smith and David Ricardo supporting free market economies. Opposed to State regulation and an exponent of laissez faire (French for ‘let it be’), Smith became famous for the ‘invisible hand’ (Smith Citation1776) concept that self-adjusted the economy through demand and supply and unseen market force dynamics, which he argued drew self-interested individuals to unintentionally benefit society. Ricardo is known for his theory ‘Law of Comparative Advantage’ in favour of free trade, and argued that countries benefited from free trade by specialising in goods where they have the lowest opportunity cost, even if another country is better at producing everything (absolute advantage) (Costinot and Donaldson Citation2012). Ironically, China’s present trade strategy heavily employs liberal Ricardo’s ‘Theory of Comparative Advantage’ against liberal democracies of the West, by specialising in manufacturing due to low labour costs (its comparative edge) to export goods, while importing resources, inviting charges of market manipulation by erstwhile colonial powers (Murdock Citation2020).

Classical Liberalism was also influenced by the ideology of Utilitarianism, as promulgated by Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) and John Stuart Mill (1806–1873), encapsulated in the famous phrase, ‘the greatest happiness of the greatest number’. The philosophy of utilitarianism (Bentham Citation1789) itself had many detractors from within Liberalism, as it was claimed that happiness cannot be defined or measured by the so-called ‘happiness calculus’, nor should it be debased by bringing it down to the lowest common denominator of public pleasure, taste and values. Even John Stuart Mill tried to develop ‘qualitative differences in happiness’ by giving higher priority to intellectual pursuits than baser pleasures and proposed plural voting for educated citizens in order to prevent the sway of ‘ignorance’ in the voting pattern of the uneducated majority (Turner Citation2024). However, Utilitarianism not only played its part in strengthening the idea of majoritarian democracy closer to the ideal of liberal polity, Jeremy Bentham even advocated LGBTQ+ rights in his time, arguing for the decriminalisation of homosexuality on account of his ‘greatest happiness’ principle (Dabhoiwala Citation2014).

Despite victories for Western Liberalism with the US Declaration of Independence on 4 July 1776 and the French Revolution emblazoning the slogan ‘Liberté, égalité, fraternité’ (which translates to ‘Liberty, Equality, Fraternity’), most 18th and 19th century liberal scholars and politicians were opposed to the idea of popular sovereignty, as only property owners were granted the right to vote.

Even the Founding Fathers of the American Revolution, particularly the ‘Father of the Constitution’ James Madison, the second US President John Adams, and renowned US Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, were apprehensive about direct democracy and feared it might usher in a populist governance that might adversely impact the ideological foundations of a liberal State. Thus, they preferred Republicanism over direct democracy, backed by a liberal constitutional framework, separation of powers as well as other checks and balances, to ensure sustained adherence of the State to liberal values.

Although France fully implemented universal adult suffrage in 1848, other European countries—like Finland (1906) and the UK (1918)—adopted universal suffrage only in the 20th century. Switzerland in fact, did not grant full voting rights to women until 1971 (Hendrickson Citation1971).

Similarly, equal voting rights for all Americans—mainly for the African-American population—was achieved after a long political struggle, and culminated with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and Voting Rights of 1965. In sharp contrast, India constitutionally adopted universal adult suffrage as early as 1950, granting all adult citizens (regardless of their caste, religion, gender, education or income) the right to vote, despite large-scale poverty and low levels of education (May Citation2013).

New or progressive Liberalism (social contract for women and the working class)

Classical Liberalism in its early years was not in favour of direct democracy or even voting rights for the entire population, namely for women, slaves or the colonised people. In fact, it believed that ‘universal adult suffrage’ would usher in the ‘tyranny of the majority’, a phrase developed by French political thinker Alexis de Tocqueville in his book, Democracy in America (1835–1840) (Tocqueville Citation1835). It has even been argued that classical Liberalism provided the intellectual framework to justify the economic interests of industrialists and the political control of colonisers, who sought to rid themselves of the restrictions imposed by ruling monarchies and the entrenched feudal order (Dagger Citation2025). Thus, classical Liberalism, even until the early half of the 20th century, sought to exclude colonised peoples and the working class from full political rights and participation in government.

The inherent contradictions within classical Liberalism which sought liberty for nouveau riche industrialists and entrepreneurs and overlooked the political and economic rights of women and underprivileged communities, created a splinter within the movement, and towards the end of the 19th century and in the early 20th century, public demands for an overhaul of the social contract with inclusion of the disenfranchised began to grow in Western society. This revolt was labelled New Liberalism or Social Liberalism in the UK and Progressivism in the US. Many liberal thinkers of that time were concerned about the growing inequality between the rich and the poor in society caused by unfettered ‘laissez faire’ free market-driven economic policies, and the growing discontent among the working class, fomented by the new radical philosophies of communism and anarchism.

Thus, classical Liberalism gradually transitioned into New Liberalism (also called Social Liberalism or Welfare Liberalism) in the UK and into Progressive Liberalism in the US and other West European countries. Unlike classical liberals, the Social or Welfare Liberals were not averse to State interference in social and economic affairs of society, but favoured a greater role of the State in bringing about social justice and strengthening the rule of law that applied equally to all rungs of society. Thus, the State was no longer tolerated as a ‘necessary evil’, but as a means for regulating the economy (if not society), in addition to its earlier role of securing life, liberty and property. Thus, the State was now asked to rein-in hitherto unfettered capitalist markets (working under the laissez faire principle), curtail the monopoly of the new breed of industrial oligarchs and ensure that liberal values of liberty, equality and welfare extended to all sections of society.

This new brand of Liberalism also raised its banner against the evil of slavery. Taking a dig at the iniquities of classical Liberalism, African-American social reformer Frederick Douglass famously wrote in his Essay titled, ‘Destiny of Colored Americans’, in 1849, ‘The white man’s happiness cannot be purchased by the black man’s misery’ (Douglass Citation1849).

However, New Liberalism and US Progressivism was not driven solely by altruistic motivations. It is often argued that US President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation (1863), which led the US to then ban slavery through the Thirteenth Amendment (1865), was supported by the industrialised North that sought to access freed black labourers as workers for their companies, in addition to new industrial oligarchs settling their scores against the old upper class of landholding nobles (Eric Williams Citation1944).

Ironically, the liberals of the 19th century never opposed the idea of British colonisation of India and yet it is believed that liberal Governors-General and Viceroys of the British Raj—Lord William Bentinck, Lord Dufferin, Lord Ripon etc.—were somewhat less oppressive than their conservative counterparts.

However, State intervention to rescue the economy from the excessive profiteering and market manipulations of rich individualistic entrepreneurs and business houses, rose to prominence mainly with President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal of 1937. From now on, the State was not seen as a ‘necessary evil’, but a saviour of society and the national economy, from the unprincipled exploits of private corporations that appropriated more wealth for itself at the expense of the wages of the labour class, which led to frequent boom and bust cycles as impoverished customers could not afford to buy products manufactured by the industrial class. In addition, free-market capitalism often led to the rise of monopolistic oligarchies that controlled markets and made it difficult for new business start-ups and entrepreneurs to compete. This reality became too evident in the Wall Street crash of 1929 and led to the decade-long Great Depression across the world. It was at this time that the ‘New Liberal’ John Maynard Keynes implemented large-scale government spending (deficit spending) on public works and social programmes to create jobs, increase wages, boost demand and to bring stability to the economy.

Three waves of neoliberalism

Although Keynesian economics is said to have contributed in bringing the US and Western economies back on track after the Second World War, the recovery never truly picked up pace that was blamed on the high-handed bureaucratic regulations that were put in place in the wake of the Great Depression (Keynes Citation1936). The tardy economic growth following the Second World War worsened by the 1970s in the wake of the Vietnam War and the oil shock, causing the debilitating occurrence of ‘stagflation’ (i.e., stagnant economic growth, high inflation and high unemployment). Sensing opportunity, classical liberal economists like Frederick Hayek (Hayek Citation1944) and Milton Friedman planned a comeback by calling for a return to free-market economics and privatisation of the public sector, thus putting the increasingly unpopular Keynesian economics to rest.

Following Hayek and Friedman’s economic prescription, US President Ronald Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher reverted to principles of free-market classical Liberalism and upended Keynesian State interventionism by reducing government spending, lowering taxes for the rich, initiating privatisation of the public sector and championing deregulation of businesses. This change shifted the balance of power back in favour of the private sector corporations, and State intervention in economic matters was disapproved. The ensuing Reagan-Thatcher ‘special relationship’ of the 1980s ushered in, what is now known as the ‘first wave’ of neoliberalism (Steger and Roy Citation2021).

A great admirer of Hayek’s famous book ‘The Road to Serfdom’, Thatcher firmly believed that a planned economy led to totalitarian thinking, be it of National Socialism (Nazi) in Germany or communism. However, Hayek himself was not as averse to totalitarianism and often viewed democracy as putting too much power in the hands of the people (Bowman Citation2024). A supporter of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, Hayek made a controversial statement in an interview to the Chilean newspaper El Mercurio in 1981: ‘Personally I prefer a liberal dictator to democratic government lacking liberalism’ (Whyte Citation2023).

However, the neoliberal model of big business-driven economy took off globally mainly after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, propelled by the increased role of liberal international institutions like the IMF and World Bank (promoting privatisation of public services and reduced State spending across the world) and rapid advancements in technology like the Internet and satellite communications. In the wake of this technology-driven globalisation of trade and communications, US President Bill Clinton and British Prime Minister Tony Blair introduced a fusion of neoliberal economic policies and social democratic social policies in the 1990s, called the ‘Third Way’. Pursuing a more centrist political ideology, the main tenet of this ‘second wave of neoliberalism’ was that State support (welfare) was conditional on the personal effort of the individual, and thus it invented the neologism ‘workfare’. The State’s role in principle became that of an enabler, rather than as a sole provider of services, using public–private partnerships (Whyman Citation2025).

However, the Barack Obama presidency ushered in the so-called ‘third wave of neoliberalism’ after the 2008 economic meltdown, by giving up on the Clinton–Blair ‘Third Way’ coinage and by ushering in liberalism led by too-good-to-fail banks and corporates that paved the way for greater deregulation and monetary easing, even as lip service was paid to Leftist political rhetoric for supporting the under-privileged (Jutel Citation2012). In fact, a report by researchers at the IMF in 2016 expressed concern over the ill effects of Western neoliberal policies that it claimed was increasing economic inequalities around the world and heightening a sense of insecurity among populations over wages, pensions and worsening living conditions (Rajan and Kumar Citation2024).

Thus, neoliberalism in the 21st century seems to have dissociated itself from the conceptions of both classical Liberalism and social Liberalism. Driven neither by free market concepts nor by socialist idealism, neoliberalism today prioritises and empowers big corporations, which are accused of having an influence over political decision-making and for placing economic interests of the oligopolistic corporate class at the centre of the Government’s socio-economic policies (Hathaway Citation2020). In fact, neoliberalism of the day is often accused of deriving its strength from State protection rather than from free-market competitive performance, in that they repeatedly demand bailouts from the State for its too-big-to fail financial institutions and industries, often at the expense of the average taxpayer (Stiglitz Citation2009). Neoliberalism has also distanced itself from free-market libertarianism (based on Murray Rothbard and the Austrian School), in that, the latter opposes oligopoly and the State’s reluctance to allow free-market corrections (Rich Citation2022).

Thus, neoliberalism has received criticism from a wide range of both Right-wing and Left-wing economists like Nobel prize-winning economists Joseph Stiglitz and Amartya Sen, conservative philosopher Roger Scruton and US economist Martin Wolfe, to name a few. It is alleged that neoliberalism often leads to the proliferation of an opaque State–corporate nexus, for creating oligopolistic markets worldwide, as well as for promoting consumerist and materialistic outlooks over traditional ethics, family and community values, etc (Youde Citation2009).

Many peace activists often analyse 21st century wars through the lens of ‘military neoliberalism’. It is alleged that West-led interventions of the day are launched with the stated purpose of military pacification, but end up restructuring the target nations’ economies to favour transnational resource extraction.

Thus, neoliberalism is often seen at odds with the traditional liberal peace theory that supports global economic cooperation and interdependence, respect for the sovereignty of nation-states, and strong international institutions, following norms of a liberal rules-based order. From its origins that championed tolerance and co-existence as its fundamental principles, critics like Jan Dobbernack and Jim Jones posit that the neoliberal world practises a kind of ‘muscular Liberalism’, which seeks to strategically enforce ‘mono-culturalism’ and revive a masculinist-colonialist past (Dobbernack Citation2014; Jose Citation2015). The detractors of neoliberalism cite the Epstein files case as an example where a new class of neo-liberal global elite undermines international political, financial, and legal institutions by indulging in the most pernicious acts of unimaginable political blackmail and criminal debauchery.

Post-modern left-liberal ‘Wokeism’

The confusion surrounding the nature, values and scope of neo-liberalism in various facets of life has increased to such an extent that sociologists, economists and political scientists, like Philip Mirowski and Dieter Plehwe, point out the difficulty in defining it in its present form. Thus, they state, ‘We have thus far neglected to “define” neoliberalism. This is because the premier point to be made about neoliberalism is that it cannot adequately be reduced to a set of Ten Commandments … Neoliberalism is a slippery concept, meaning different things to different people. Scholars have examined the relationships between neoliberalism and a vast array of conceptual categories’ (Mirowski and Plehwe Citation2009).

The statement is symptomatic of post-modernism as a kind of Liberalism that, despite upholding the values of individualism and freedom, deconstructs grandiose liberal ‘meta-narratives’ of modernity and progress as a new set of misleading constructs about ‘objective reality’ and ‘universal truths’, coined to promote the agenda of dominant power structures.

Post-modernism became a broad philosophical, cultural and political movement in the post-World War era as sceptical reaction to ‘Modernism’ which, in the 19th and early 20th century, had propagated the values of ‘impeccable rationality’ and ‘scientific progress’ as leading the way towards inevitable and enlightened human development. The social and economic confusion and challenges caused by the Industrial Revolution and the use of advanced weaponry leading to the World Wars followed by a nuclear arms race, however disillusioned the post-World War generations with regard to the objective and absolutist claims of supposedly liberal and rational Western States.

Political scientists like Michel Foucault and Agamben sought to expose the inherent subjectivity behind ‘objective facts’ of State propaganda, and exposed the sophistry involved in manufacturing so-called ‘democratic consent’, with the aim of imposing greater control over populations at the expense of liberal values.

Thus, post-modern political philosophers propounded theories by which liberal States use sophisticated ways to influence the minds of their democratised masses. Michael Foucault’s notions of ‘Bio-Power’ and ‘Bio-Politics’ suggested how modern States turn individual bodies into docile and useful subjects, almost like machines, through institutions like schools, hospitals, and prisons (Foucault Citation1990). Giorgio Agamben’s ‘State of Exception’ posits how modern liberal States initially use ‘temporary’ emergency powers, originally meant to preserve law, only to suspend them indefinitely, blurring the line between exceptional and normative measures (Agamben Citation2005).

The impact of such post-modernist theories have undermined the liberal credentials of Western socio-political institutions and States over a period and paved the way for a post-modern framework, often called ‘Critical Social Justice’, which gave rise to the Left-wing movement of Wokeism.

Beginning as a 20th-century African-American colloquialism meaning to be ‘awake’ or alert to racial prejudice and injustice, ‘Wokeism’ today is a major Left-wing movement (mainly in the US), which rebels against alleged discriminatory socio-economic structures within the liberal order. ‘Woke’ activism is mainly directed towards securing the rights of the marginalised (on the basis of their race, gender or for being part of the LGBTQ+ community).

In Trump’s second term, the socio-political backlash from Western Right-wing groups against ‘Wokeism’ for its supposed over-insistence on political correctness and allegedly divisive ‘identity politics’ in the socio-political discourse, has dealt a blow even to the Left-wing rhetoric of Obama’s brand of ‘neoliberalism’. Supporters of Trump’s Right-wing Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement have particularly targeted Wokeism for promoting the so-called ‘cancel culture’ (viz., the practice of collectively boycotting and shaming people perceived to have violated ‘Woke’ sensibilities). Thus, the divide between Right-wing liberals (libertarians and neoliberals) against Left-wing progressives is now acutely polarising Western liberal democratic polities.

Religious, nationalist extremism and Plato’s ‘ship of fools’

In a pushback to this post-modern political and ethical dissonance, religious fundamentalism and revisionist nationalism have risen as a major threat to liberal values and institutions. In recent years, several social and political thinkers, like Anthony Giddens, in his book, The Runaway World (published in 1999) (Giddens Citation1999) and Zygmunt Bauman Liquid Modernity (published in 2000) (Bauman Citation2000), have studied the rise in religious fundamentalism and hyper-nationalism as a response to the breakdown of liberal values and sensibilities. While Giddens believes fundamentalism and hyper-nationalism promise stable roots at a time when traditional structures (family, State, religion) offer less security, Bauman views fundamentalism not as a pre-modern relic, but as a ‘solid’ or unshakeable ideology designed to counter the loss of fixed values, ‘liquid’ concepts and fluid social structures of post-modern times.

According to Giddens, fundamentalism and nationalism have gained greater resonance in the post-modern world because they offer simple, clear and absolute ‘answers’ as well as ‘rigid rules’, as opposed to the dissonant values of post-modern liberal society. Therefore, it is not surprising that Samuel Huntington’s once vilified ‘clash of civilisations’ proposition has continued to gain acceptability in academic circles, even after three decades of its publication (Huntington Citation1996).

Meanwhile, the sense of a cultural and national identity crisis in a globalising world, distrust in the effectiveness and fairness of international liberal institutions, and the desire for greater security of countries, has given way to religious radicalism and hyper-nationalist supremacism across the globe. The success of totalitarian States in achieving high rates of economic growth and technological innovation, as exemplified by China and to some extent by Russia, has also shattered the myth that liberal democracies are a pre-requisite to economic and technological progress and development. China’s existing Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) that involves over 150 countries and organisations globally, its nascent Global Development Initiative (GDI), Global Security Initiative (GSI) and Global Civilisation Initiative, champion values not in consonance with those of liberal democracies.

The rise of strongman leadership in erstwhile secular States like the US, Turkey, Hungary, etc., and gradual ascendance of far-Right politics in European States ominously point to Plato’s ‘ship of fools’ analogy in The Republic, that predicts democracy’s eventual regress into tyranny. With all due respect to the celebrated Greek philosopher, the time has come for the globalised order to disprove Plato’s comparison of democracy to a ship where the sailors (the people) ignore the knowledgeable captain (his ideal ‘philosopher-king’) and instead follow a popular but unskilled navigator (‘demagogue’), which leads to disaster (Jowett, 1998).

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References

1. Agamben, G. 2005. State of Exception. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Monday, February 19, 2024

THE LIBERALISM HARAKIRI