Illusions of Freedom

The notion that there is a threshold above which authoritarian nations would democratize is attractive, but our experience since the end of the Cold War suggests this view is too simplistic and results in a risky foreign policy stance for the West

Illusions of Freedom



A narrative has dominated the West’s foreign policy since the end of the Cold War: if we increase per capita GDP in authoritarian nations, they will democratize.

Most notably, this doctrine was applied to China, and yet China failed to move away from its authoritarian system. Russia has gotten wealthier and returned to authoritarianism. Both nations used the West as an export market and a source of technology (obtained both legally and illegally) and gave little in return.

Over the past decade, China’s real per capita GDP has nearly tripled. No sign of democratization, and instead we see aggressive behavior towards its neighbors. Russia’s constant dollar GDP per person increased 50 percent since 2003 (compared to less than 9 percent in both the U.S. and Canada). It’s authoritarianism increases almost by the day, and not only is it behaving aggressively towards its neighbors, it is currently involved in outright invasions, occupations, and annexations. None of this was supposed to happen.

An article at The Economist from 2009 encapsulates this problematic thinking. Almost all of the predictions therein have been overly opimistic from a western perspective.
http://www.economist.com/node/14678547

According to this piece, “[s]ome time in the next 20 years, if China’s growth stays on course, its economy will overtake America’s to become the largest in the world.” That would place China’s GDP surpassing the USA’s by 2029. Actually, it took place during the past year.
http://www.imf.org/external/datamapper/?trails=false&db=weo&showoutliers=false&bubbleshowlabels=true&mapyaxis=linear&indicatory=lp&combichart=&xaxis=logarithmic&interactive=true&area=&indicatorx=ngdpd&chart=linechartview&bubbleshowall=true&year=2020&tab=mapview&bubblehighlighttype=0&histogram=&mapexploded=&bubbledisplaytype=countries&speed=5&defaultsubjects=&indicator=pppgdp&yaxis=logarithmic&geoitems=chn,usa&maximize=both&mark=&showall=false&bubbleexploded=&indicatorsize=

China was predicted to democratize—at least partially—by 2020:

Henry Rowen of Stanford University has predicted that by 2020 Freedom House, an American NGO, will rate China as ‘partly free’ in its annual country rankings (putting it in the same category as relatively open but not fully democratic societies such as Singapore and Hong Kong) ... Mr Rowen bases his optimism on the numbers. By 2020, he reckons, China’s GDP per person at 1998 purchasing-power parity [PPP] will be over $7,500. In 1998 all but three of the 31 countries above this level of GDP per person were rated as free.


In 1998, Cuba’s per capita GDP-PPP was $7,630—and it was certainly not free. There appears to have been 68 nations above a $7,500 per capita GDP-PPP base in 1998, including the non-free countries of Iran, Iraq, Brunei Darussalam, Saudi Arabia, and the rest of the Arab states of the Persian Gulf.
http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/ny.gdp.pcap.pp.cd

Now we appear to see an even larger number of non-free nations well past this $7,500 GDP-PPP in 1998 dollars benchmark (adjusted using 2011 constant dollar per capita GDP-PPP), including Albania, Ecuador, Egypt, Jordan, China, Algeria, Turkmenistan, Thailand, Iraq, Russia, Iran, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Lebanon, Belarus, Venezuela, Gabon, Kazakhstan, Equatorial Guinea, Brunei Darussalam, and—of course—the rest of the Persian Gulf states.
http://www.sudestada.com.uy/content/articles/421a313a-d58f-462e-9b24-2504a37f6b56/democracy-index-2014.pdf

http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/ny.gdp.pcap.pp.kd

Collectively, these wealthier non-free countries make up 30 percent of the global economy and are home to 2.1 billion people, and these numbers are growing rapidly.

The notion that there is a threshold above which authoritarian nations would democratize is attractive, but our experience since the end of the Cold War suggests this view is too simplistic and results in a risky foreign policy stance for the West. It is time for a rethink.



By Sierra Rayne