The Process of Deterioration of Liberal Democracy in the Visegrad Group Countries: Institutional Perspective

Contemporary changes of liberal democracy affect different countries of the world. The Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, known as the Visegrad Group countries (V4), are among them. Although the countries seemed to be on a good way to consolidated democracy, about a decade ago the first symptoms of deterioration of liberal democracy became apparent. In the text, attention is focused on the institutional level, which should resist certain challenges in mature democracies. The institutions in V4 were weak and liable to be subordinated by strong political leaders and populist parties, and not strong enough to fight off illiberal tendencies. The analysis reveals that Poland and Hungary were more prone to compromise liberal democratic achievements, while the Czech Republic and Slovakia less so. This paper answers the questions of the institutional causes behind the deterioration of liberal democracy and the effects it brings.

Hobbes and Spinoza on Sovereign Education

Most comparisons of Thomas Hobbes and Baruch Spinoza focus on the difference in understanding of natural right. We argue that Hobbes also places more weight on a rudimentary and exclusive education of the public by the state. We show that the difference is related to deeper disagreements over the prospect of Enlightenment. Hobbes is more sanguine than Spinoza about using the state to make people rational. Spinoza considers misguided an overemphasis on publicly educating everyone out of superstition—public education is important, but modes of superstition may remain and must be offset by institutions and a civil religion. The differences are confirmed by Spinoza’s interest in the philosopher who stands apart and whose flourishing may be protected, but not simply brought about, by rudimentary public education. Spinoza’s openness to a wisdom-loving elite in a democracy also sets up an interesting parallel with Thomas Jefferson’s own commitment to the natural aristocracy needed to sustain republicanism. In demonstrating the 17th century philosopher’s skepticism toward using the state exclusively to promote rationality, even as he recognizes the importance of a sovereign pedagogical role and the protection of philosophy, we move to suggest that Spinoza is relevant to contemporary debates about public education and may reinvigorate moral and political discourse in a liberal democracy.

What is planning without property? Relational practices of being and belonging

What is planning without property? This question was recently posed to me following a conference presentation. In this paper, I argue that taking this question seriously reveals unchallenged assumptions about the relationship between planning and property. Focusing on Canada as a settler colonial liberal democracy, I respond to this question by looking at the Indian Act which has supported colonial dispossession and assimilation in Canada for almost 200 years and rely on Brenna Bhandar’s conceptualization of “racial regimes of property” as a means of examining how racial subjects and private property are co-produced. I then look to the practices reflected in the creation of Nadia Myre's artwork Indian Act to show how Indigenous epistemologies can aid in the conceptualization of planning without property. I argue that planning without property would be an approach to planning that would be focused on identifying, making, and strengthening the human and more-than-human relationships the flourishing of life requires. Thus, planning without property would support practices of being and belonging rather than practices of exclusion and domination.

The Patterns of Democracy in Context of Historical Political Science

The patterns of democracy are related to the success or failure of national governance; hence, they are a key topic in the theoretical research of political science. It is difficult to comprehend the worldwide political conflicts caused by the promotion of liberal democracy in the study of democratic models that have liberal democracy as their core. The emphasis of historical political science on the genes of civilization provides an opportunity to reinterpret the patterns of democracy. Relying on specific civilization genes, the patterns of democracy can be divided into the “value pattern”, which is shaped by historical civilization genes, and the “practice pattern”, which is based on the “value pattern”. Based on Christian concepts, Western civilization produced liberal democracy as the value pattern, and the value is inherited through the practice pattern of party democracy. Chinese civilization has continued the tradition of people-orientation and consultative practice, establishing socialist democracy in value and consultative democracy in practice. Theoretically, the analytical framework of the value pattern and the practice pattern of democracy illustrates the source of the diverse patterns of democracy, which helps demonstrate the limitations of liberal democracy and points out the possibility of developing a non-liberal democracy pattern.

The “populist” foundation of liberal democracy: Jan-Werner Müller, Chantal Mouffe, and post-foundationalism

This article examines the connection between populism and post-foundationalism in the context of contemporary debates about populism as a strategy for the Left. I argue that there is something “populist” about every constitutional order, including liberal democratic ones. I argue so drawing on Chantal Mouffe’s theories of hegemony, agonistic democracy, and left populism. Populism is the quintessential form of post-foundational politics because, rightly understood, populism constructs the object it claims to represent, namely the people. As such, it expresses the fact that, because there is no ultimate foundation, politics consists in the construction of contingent foundations. I develop this argument through readings of Jan-Werner Müller and Chantal Mouffe, showing the differences between their respective post-foundational approaches. I show that Müller cannot uphold the distinction between populism and democracy in the way he seeks to do, but I also argue that this does not mean that we must jettison all normativity, only that it requires that we rethink normativity in hegemonic terms.

Liberal Feminism: Emphasizing Individualism and Equal Rights in Meena Kandasamy’s When I Hit You

Liberal feminism is the emerging mainstream feminism that spotlights gender inequality and women’s liberation within the context of liberal democracy. The aim of the study focuses on the perspectives of liberal feminism using prominent ideas of liberal thinkers in Meena Kandasamy’s award-winning novel When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife (2017). The methodology of the study includes concepts of liberal feminism in the text, and it is substantiated and explored using the ideologies of notable liberal thinkers such as Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women, Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique and John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty and The Subjection of Women. The protagonist’s transition from a submissive to a self-liberated persona strengthens the novel’s credibility as a liberal feminist text. The paper also attempts to show that the concepts of liberal feminism very well appear in the selected text.

The Axiological and Praxeological Relationship Between Political Islam and Liberal Democracy

The question of the correlation between Islam, political Islam, and liberal democracy has so far been the most exposed topic in exploring the democratic capacity of political Islam and Islamic societies in general. What is particularly intriguing about the relationship between political Islam and liberal democracy is the fact of its Westernized triviality that has received a pejorative tone in Islamic political circles. The following chapter analyzes the relationship of political Islam to specific inherent categories of liberal democracy such as the rule of law, representative government, the separation of powers, and secularism as differentia specifica of liberal Western democratic discourse. This chapter argued how appropriate tangent or divergence is illustrated and how this is reflected in the general ideological positioning of political Islam towards the liberal democracy in the Muslim countries through an axiological and praxeological perspective.

The Role and Significance of Traditional Leadership in South African Local Governance

Traditional leadership in South Africa pre-existed both the colonial and apartheid systems of governance and was the main known system of governance amongst indigenous people. In any case, as opposed to the current political pattern of discrediting traditional leadership, Africans have their own comprehension of democracy, which is pointedly from the liberal democracy of the West. Traditional leadership was democratic based on its own unique way in what we these days allude to as ‘consensus'. This chapter contends that the institution of traditional leadership is still significant as a trusted institution for governance by most of the people living in rural South Africa. The chapter contends as revered in the Basotho aphorism, mooa khotla ha a tsekisoe maxim, that traditional leadership is a sine qua non in rural areas. The South African post-apartheid government has neglected to conclusively characterize and unambiguously explain the role and significance of traditional leaders in local governance.

On the academic freedom in the times of crisis of liberal democracy

Motivation: The crisis of liberal democracy reveals a new dimension to the dispute over the role of the university. Declining trust in elites and the growing uncertainty during the pandemic challenge the belief that the key aim of the university reform should be to subject it to the global mechanism of competition as well as to introduce modern management principles. In the American society, there is a growing belief that the higher education system in the United States is heading in the wrong direction and that universities are politically biased. Despite this, the American system inspires higher education all over the world, including Poland. Even during the pandemic, the attention of the academic community in Poland is focused on the lists of journals constituting the basis for the evaluation of universities and academics. Aim: The aim of the article is to demonstrate the threats posed by a higher education system governed by the dominant economic and political forces. The author evaluates the economic forces behind the parameterisation and ranking system, challenging the rationality of the Polish higher education reforms. The source of the arguments for academic freedom is the political economy that places economic goals in the perspective of long-term universal goals and examines the complex relationships between the economic, political and moral aspects. Results: Academic freedom is not a privilege of the academic world, but one of the foundations of the successful development of a democratic society because science and education cannot be subject to existing patterns of thinking and current economic and political forces. But modern universities are driven to act like firms in competitive market places and they are following trends set by short-term economic and politic interests. Political economy is an effective tool for analysing functioning of higher education operating in quasi-market conditions, imposed by the dominant market players and the state. Understanding the forces underlying the reform of universities requires an analysis of the processes of interpenetration of economic and political processes, which means that the paradigm of political economy is gaining importance. In view of the requirements imposed on universities, dictated by short-term interests, the most important thing is the awareness that the necessity of state financing means that no solution will guarantee autonomy, if there is no responsibility of the academic community and self-discipline of its members.