The road to dictatorship is depressingly predictable.
Interesting stuff from the One Handed Economist
“The road to dictatorship is depressingly predictable. Once power is stolen, the problem is to keep it. Anyone who might develop a separate power base must be struck down. Eradicate rivals, rule through force and fear. Trust no one, particularly family, friends and the army. Keep everyone on their toes with random executions, unpredictable policy changes and imaginative public tortures. So far, so historic. It could be a Shakespeare play. What distinguishes modern tyranny, Dikötter argues, is the cult of personality. Total control of the information space keeps the modern dictator in power.” Via New Statesman.
‘Dictators are indeed anti-experts who surround themselves with sycophants promoted regardless of experience or knowledge, and this may ring some bells. Trump may lie, Boris Johnson may have said he wanted to be world king, but to mention dictatorship in the same breath is to trivialise. What we are living through is democracy in action. But we’d better not forget that power can easily be stolen. Eternal vigilance, after all, is the price of liberty.’