Does democracy fit Middle east countries?
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Before we start we may need to not paint Muslim nations with the same stroke.
Africa, Middle East, Central Asian, South Asia, and Southeast Asia nations with Muslim majority have different experiences with post-colonialism, post Cold war, and so on. Muslim is also as varied as Christianity.
There is some incompatibility to countries that adhere to Sharia as they may not separate religion and government. However, lot of them don't have Islam as state religion and are considered secular in paper (but some of them are de facto Islamic states).
Using the Democracy Index, there are two flawed democracies. Indonesia and Malaysia. In Indonesia case, they are the most populated Muslim nation with remarkable diversity. When the modern state was created, most other powers didn't believe it would last long because of so many internal differences, yet apart for Timor Leste, they are hanging out and is potentially a rising star in the region. Malaysia seems to be doing fine overall as well. Tunisia ranks " high" in the index for a Muslim majority nation, but I don't see that many good news from them recently.
Some countries are kinda in hybrid systems, monarchy, or authoritarian regime. Not sure if religion has a role in all these nations not being democratic. In some cases sure. but not all as sole reason. Some of them never implemented democracy in first place. Lot of them are either in very tenuous border situation or with ton of internal instability since inception.
In some recent time liberalism was coming to Muslim majority nations like Egypt (which had a thriving movie industry at the time), but the Arab-Israeli conflict and the rise of radical elements of Islam in power just fucked this, for instance.
Still some may not even want democracy per se like Oman. It's is a stable country. It looks like odd to have an absolute monarchy in the 21st century, but it seems to be working for them.
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No, I think that democracy it's something exclusive of the white race, and it's not for being racist, but if we look at democracies around the world, they are always European countries or with a white majority (usa, canada, australia, nz, uruguay , Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica).
There are peoples (and races) in which democracy does not work, and if it works it is because it have been applied by force as in Japan or South Korea.
The countries of the Middle East, Africa, and some Latin American countries such as El Salvador or Guatemala need a leader who directs the country in a more less authoritarian way, that is the only way that those countries do not have constant internal conflicts
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No, I think that democracy it's something exclusive of the white race, and it's not for being racist, but if we look at democracies around the world, they are always European countries or with a white majority (usa, canada, australia, nz, uruguay , Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica).
There are peoples (and races) in which democracy does not work, and if it works it is because it have been applied by force as in Japan or South Korea.
The countries of the Middle East, Africa, and some Latin American countries such as El Salvador or Guatemala need a leader who directs the country in a more less authoritarian way, that is the only way that those countries do not have constant internal conflicts
I'd not say it is exclusive for the white race as there are lot of undemocratic "white" nations too unless you wanna throw Balkan nations under the bus. Western Europe and some of the UK colonies developed modern democracies. They can boast having over a century of democracy.
Even by some of the examples like Chile, they went to democratization to authoritarian to democratization. Not sure if pointing out race is important. Could have just said nations under Western influence without using the "not being racist" card and pointing out race. Some nations in Africa are considered flawed democracies which is good enough all things considered as not even USA is considered a working democracy (well it is one rank down for being one, so I guess it is both).
Not sure if I can get behind your statement of saying SK had democracy applied by force by others. Maybe yes initially (but I'd say freedom fighters who fought Japanese colonialism wanted that and the first elected president was one), but it developed into a dictatorship post Korean War. The process of democratization (which is fairly recent like 90s and early 00s) wasn't imposed by others but popular movements. Similarly Taiwan didn't start as a proper democracy and went to a similar process left by their own devices rather imposed by others.
In Japan case maybe your statement is kinda accurate, but some argument can be made that seeds of democracy were already there during the 10s and 20s, but the Imperial military just took over during the 30s and halted all progress to feed their imperial ambitions further. So when the Allies took over after the Japanese defeat, implementing democratic institutions were quite easy compared to other heavy handed ways to impose some form of "democratic" puppet governments around the world post WWII and Cold War.
If you wanna use Japan as an example, Germany went to the same process. I guess if we go to ethnocentric view, white race also created fascism and centralized dictatorships too. White people create shit ton of stuff, but not sure if applying an ethnocentric argument is even necessary to this discussion.
With the exception of UK and Western Europe, working democracy is rather very new with some being barely over 50 years. Even if you count USA as the oldest (depending on how one defines working democracy), it is just over 200 years. For most of history, some form of absolute/authoritarian government was the norm. Lot of nations are just barely held together as well. Democratization is an on-going slow process and it is living history. It's a complex subjective that can be viewed in many different ways.
Going back to the question of Islam and democracy, I guess some cultural or ethnocentric explanation could be applied which seems what the direction of TC was going for. I'd go with it depends by case by case or at least region by region. This particular religion may be a huge factor, but for some cases, it seems not the main reason.
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It comes down to collective intelligence to develop and character of a society. If a country isn’t good at developing industry they will live like the old days with the patriarchy and religion being more important than consumerism
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imo democracy only works when the society and population is ready for it. Forcing democracy upon a population who is not ready is a disaster waiting to happen and does more harm than good.
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imo democracy only works when the society and population is ready for it. Forcing democracy upon a population who is not ready is a disaster waiting to happen and does more harm than good.
Yes that's right.
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