Stories of Democracy

Brahma Chellaney’s musings:

• …For long, democracy and free markets were touted as the twin answer to most ills.
• ..Asia, only a small minority of states are true democracies, despite the eastward movement of global power and influence.
• ….authoritarianism is deeply entrenched, a marketplace of goods and services simply does not allow a marketplace of political ideas.
• …China holds no elections to elect its leaders, not even sham elections.
• ..Even if democratic governments are not more wedded to peace than autocracies, it is well established that democracies rarely go to war with each other.
• ….the main challenge to the global spread of democracy comes from the model blending political authoritarianism and state-steered capitalism together. What if such authoritarian capitalism becomes the face of the future in large parts of the world?