Category Archives: Fascism

Are we hard-wired for autocracy?

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, American Fascism, Authoritarianism, Critical thinking, Death of Democracy, Fascism, The Sleep of Reason, Tyranny and Fascism

 

Jonathan R Goodman in an article in the Guaridan earlier this year asked this question “Are we hard-wired for autocracy? That is the big question.

 

Here is what he said,

A recent piece of research [in the UK] suggested that more than half of people aged between 13 and 27 would prefer the UK to be an authoritarian dictatorship… The way we evolved predisposes us to place trust in those who often deserve it least – in a sense, hardwiring us to support the most Machiavellian among us and to propel them into power. This seems like an intractable problem. But it’s what we do in the face of that knowledge that matters.

 

Yascha Mounk, Associate professor  at Johns Hopkins University in Washington D.C. made similar claims about the US and backed it up with personal research. If both the US and UK are headed toward autocracy the world is in trouble. Sadly, there is a lot of evidence that this is the case.

 

Part of the problem is that humans have a strong liking to be led by strong men. Like our primate cousins. As Goodman wrote,

 

“Recent work in anthropology and primatology shows how this wiring evolved. Our ancient ancestors, like most primates today, lived in groups dominated by violent and aggressive alpha males. Yet over the course of our biological and cultural evolution, unlike our primate cousins, we learned to work together to counter those bullyboys, organising to diminish their influence.We learned that cooperation was more effective than bloody competition. We don’t have to be ruled by bullies, but it is natural so we must be careful, diligent and smart to resist the “natural” tendency. In fact, many now realized that it is through cooperation much more than individual initiative that humans have mastered the globe, where our primate cousins have fallen behind us in development.  As Goodman said, “Where we see brute power combined with ignorance, we can throw our support behind knowledge, peaceful protest and education.”

 

Our nearest evolutionary neighbours, chimpanzees,  also cooperate but not to the extent that we do. They are much more likely to be led by strong alpha males, though sadly and unwisely, in my view, we seem to be evolving towards their approach. Goodman put it this way in his article: “It’s human nature to trust strongmen, but we’ve also evolved the tools to resist them…”

 

The researchers  pointed out we have more recently evolved to cooperate more and compete less. That has come about from learning biases. In other words humans have evolved to believe what other people around us believe, particularly those we see as being successful. For example, in the US many people see Trump as successful. I don’t but they do. People evolved to believe the strong men in their group because that was where they could find protection. Scientists call these conformity or prestige biases.

 

There was an interesting scientific work by the  psychologist Solomon Asch that showed people would tend to believe what successful people around them believed, even when they were wrong. For example, he devised a test where people were asked a simple question. He asked them to compare 2 lines on a piece of paper that were actually the same length. But when they heard others around them say one was longer than the other, they tended to believe it as well.  This probably evolved with us when we lived in small hunting groups. However, those overly trusting beliefs can lead us into serious trouble. Autocratic leaders for example can exploit this natural tendency. Many of the autocrats  are very skillful at manipulating others. Goodman put it this way:

 

Some people call this trait proactive aggression, others, Machiavellian intelligence,  or the ability and inclination to dominate not with violence, but via social manoeuvring and deceit.

 

It is easy to see how this can apply to autocratic or wanna be autocratic leader, such as Victor Orbán in Hungary  or Trump. In other words they found that we can favor those among us who pretend to cooperate at least until they stop. Then they become rivals. We have to be smarter and think more critically.

 

These evolutionary traits can be helpful or dangerous.  When we realize we have these traits, as do most people around us, we have to be careful to look out for bad signs of trouble ahead. We can resist these tendencies, but too often don’t,

How did Hungary fall into Authoritarianism?

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, American Fascism, Death of Democracy, Fascism, Hungary, Populism, The Sleep of Reason, Tyranny and Fascism

 

Retuning to my question of how was it possible for a country such as Hungary to move from democracy to autocracy, I want to look at Hungary as a prime example.

 

Guardian writer Danielle Renwick wrote about how people learn to live with a dictator. To look at this issue from the perspective of Hungary she interviewed  Stefania Kapronczay the former head of Hungarian Civil Liberties Union.

 

In comparing the United States to Hungary she made one very important point that surprised me. Kapronczay said what is happening in the US does in fact echo what happened in Hungary but with one big difference:

 

“It’s happening much faster, and it’s surprising for me that so many private companies and institutions just complied with the perceived or expressed will of president Trump. I didn’t expect so many people would be so risk-averse.”

 

 

Viktor Orbán was first elected to power in Hungary as a capitalistic liberal in 1998 when the people in Hungary were very unhappy with post-cold war politics. That was actually a common reaction among countries that were from the Communist bloc and then felt lost when that bloc collapsed after 1989. This is not entirely different than the recent collapse of support for democracy among large segments of American and Canadian societies. That is why Hungry is so important.

 

A lot of people in Hungary thought Democracy did not deliver what people expected after the fall of communism. They hated communism but thought they would do better with democracy than they got.  In 2002 Orbán’s party lost power as people were dissatisfied and voted out his party.

 

Then later Orbán returned to power as the head of government after the Hungarian democratic elections in 2010 and then he was a different leader. He was no longer the liberal, so he changed the rules in his own favor. First, he changed the voting rules so it would be easier to get his party elected the next time. Trump did this too and is doing it now. I know Democrats have done that too but during this time Republicans in the US controlled more states. I often think very few people in the US actually want democracy.  Each time one party is in power they change rules for their own benefit.

 

Orbán, again like Trump, also stacked the judicial system with people who supported him. He also attacked the liberal universities, like the one run by Canada’s former leader of the Liberal party, Michael Ignatieff. Trump has done the same thing in the US. Orbán also went after the press to toe the party line, just as Trump has been doing with vigor. Orbán also attack unfriendly NGOs and again Trump has followed suit.  Also, Orbán made some changes that that helped the poor in Hungary.  Trump has done a little of this, but much less.

 

The key here is gradual steps of dismantling democracy.  It does not happen with a bang. It usually happens by small steps. innocuous, but ominous small steps.

 

Kapronczay warned us in the west that opposition parties must understand that it is not good enough to run on platforms defending democracy.  That is too esoteric for many electors. Opposition parties in the west must not fail to address basic pocket book issues or they will be turfed out of office or never get back in.

 

Kapronczay also pointed out one more important thing opponents of autocracy should do is to avoid extremism. Tas she said,: “Autocrats really want to polarize the society, so any kind of initiative that goes against it is really important.”  Politicians like Trump thrive on the extremes. The more the liberals rant and scream at him and his supporters the more Trump likes it and the more his supporters think he must be doing a great job.

Polarization and autocracy go together like love and marriage.

 

So how does a country slip into autocracy from a democracy? By small steps. No steps are more dangerous than baby steps.

 

Is Hungary a Fascist State?

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, American Fascism, Death of Democracy, Fascism, Populism, The Sleep of Reason

 

 

Andrew Marantz is a writer from the New Yorker and in the last couple of years has been paying a lot of attention to Hungary. He has visited it a number of times and he is very concerned about it. Besides writing about it, he has appeared in a number of podcasts together with Tyler Foggatt as part of The New Yorker Political Scene Podcasts.

 

Like me Marantz and Foggatt wanted to know: How bad have things got? How close to an authoritarian state has the United Statement become? And they started by looking at Hungary.

 

First, Marantz said when you go to Hungary, “it’s not a police state. It’s not like Russia.” This made me feel a little better. I was at the time travelling there. I have now been there again. When I was there I worried a bit about whether or not I had to be careful of what I looked at or read or wrote about. To the extent that fear was justified, Hungary is no longer a democracy, but an authoritarian state.

 

I wondered when I was there whether or not I should worry about what I wrote on my computer? Could I criticize Hungary? Could I criticize their leader Orbán? I really didn’t  want to go to jail. But I also didn’t want to shut up either.

 

Marantz also said this about Hungary on the podcast:

 

“It’s not like, you know, North Korea.  It’s a beautiful European capital where you walk around and it’s nice and you sit by the river and sip an espresso. And I interviewed all kinds of dissidents, academics, journalists who are opposed to the regime. And they didn’t say okay, you know, we can’t talk here. We have to go somewhere where we’re not going to be, you know hauled off into a van or something. Like that’s not the vibe.”

 

That sounded pretty good. I know Christiane and I visited Budapest in 2004 and I never once, not once, felt uneasy about being in a former Soviet satellite country.  But that was then. This is now.  And thanks to Viktor Orbán things now in 2025 are very different. And Hungary is a very good example for the rest of us about what can happen to a functioning democracy. Democratic countries can slide into autocracy or illiberal democracy or even fascism and many believe Hungary has done so under the second presidency of Viktor Orbán. He changed.

 

I know this time I felt a little different. I don’t want to exaggerate the feeling, but I don’t want to deny it either. So, what happened in Hungary between our last visit in 2004 2025.

 

First, what happened in Hungary has happened in many places in varying degrees.  A lot of countries around the world have been flirting with autocracy?  I visited some of them on this trip? Romania. Bulgaria. Serbia. And above all, Hungary. Why did this happen? That is the question I would really like to answer.

 

Some have suggested that we have a natural inclination to autocracy and not democracy. Disturbing research has shown that in many countries the popularity of democracy as a political system is in serious decline. And most disturbing of all is that the decline is pronounced in the United States, the country long known as the leader of the free world. It often claims to be the first constitutional democracy. Is it possible that democracy is declining even there? There is actually a lot of evidence, particular in the reign of Trump 2.0 that it has moved sharply in that direction.  Can America and Canada learn something from what happened in Hungary? Those are things that interest me.

Hungary: From Communism to Democracy to Fascism?

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, Authoritarianism, Fascism, Hungary, The Sleep of Reason

Ever since we signed up for the tour of the Balkans, tour without adequate thought as I have said, I have thinking about Hungary?  Why would a country that came so close to a successful revolt against Soviet Union domination in 1956 that it became for a while the darling of the west, now, after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, and Hungary became a democracy  not very long ago, be sliding back into autocracy?  Hungarians  know what Communism was like? How and why could this happen? Why would they allow it to happen? These are the questions that have haunted me and for which I have sought an answer, or at least an insight. I never have answers, who am I kidding? I just get more questions.

 

It seems like such a long journey: from Communism to Democracy to Fascism, but Hungary seems to have moved there in a flash. Not that is completely fascist yet, but it sure seems to headed in that disturbing direction. To me it seems like that is the journey Hungary has embarked upon under the direction of its populist leader Viktor Orbán. But is that really such a long journey? I actually think not. After all, communists and fascists agree on one very important thing—democracy is bad; autocracy is good. It is a movement from extremism on the left communism, to democracy and then to extremism on right namely fascism.

 

It is actually a very short journey from communism to fascism. Communism began with a dream of universal brotherhood of man—i.e. from each according to his means to each according to his needs. A beautiful dream that turned into a nightmare.  As Max Eastman, said, communism was “the God that failed”. The dream curdled from hope to violence. Lenin may have been the cook that switched the recipe when the proletariat, working people, gave up the hopes of freedom and justice in favor of a dictatorship of the proletariat. When the communist leaders crushed the dreams of fellow feeling in their citizens  the  dreams of the proletariat turned inward and their hate and pain transformed  them into wolves instead.

 

When there is no longer room in the heart for empathy, it dies and kills part of us and the result is, as the singer song-writer Martyn Joseph said, “the good in us is dead.” Joseph feared would happen in that other Balkan state, Kosovo. What was left there were vicious dogs snarling and biting each other. And the brotherhood of man was given up as an empty dream. The best in them was dead. Leaving an empty burnt-out husk, incapable of love, empathy or fellow feeling. Only a corpse remained. That is the power of hate. It is as transformative as the power of love but in the opposite direction.

 

A couple of decades later, the world was left with another leader, Donald Trump who as I have said before, has the empathy of a turnip. His hatred turned a nation of brave men and women into a nation that feared itself, and found a scapegoat, the immigrants, who could be dispatched by a crowd in a packed arena at the 2020 Republican National Convention chanting gleefully, “Deportation Now.”  All of this while holding signs underneath smiling faces that read “Mass Deportation.”  This looked to me like the brownshirts of Nazi Germany who viciously turned on their Jewish neighbours. That was how the American MAGA crowd turned on their brown immigrant neighbours, demanding they be deported or sent to Latin American jails for torture. When your empathy is shredded what else could you do but shout for joy around calls to “lock them up?” The ugly ideology of Nazi Germany’s Kristallnacht had taken over in America. To me it felt viscerally, like there was a direct lineal line of descendant, from the Night of Broken glass in Germany against Jews led by the Nazi Party’s SS troops and aided by the hateful Hitler youth and then ordinary, but rancid, Germans to those American Republicans. The bullies again were in control, only this time in America.