Is liberal democracy failing?

Of all the external signs, it seems that liberal democracy is in attraction worldwide. Populistic and nationalist movements, often openly xenophobia, are on the rise in Europe. Americans have chosen a president who openly admires Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping.

Recent comments and analyses hold titles such as “How democracies” disappear. A host of new books include “People Against Democracy” of Yascha Monk, “West Suicide” and Yonah Goldberg and “Why did Patrick Deneen's b liberalisation” fail.

Yet, the question is not that liberal democracy has failed. On the contrary, liberalisation ʹ and not necessarily the kind of left in America, but a set of values involving freedom, equality, democracy, individual rights, secularism, market economy and internationalism has had a growing success.

After the reconstruction of Europe after 1945, and the triumph at the end of the Cold War, liberal order has an impressive record of promoting human well - being. But like any other system of things, it has internal contradictions. The rule of the democratic majority often conflicts with individualism; freedom, with equality; religious freedom, with personal liberation; and internationalist opening, with civic nationalism.

The benefits of liberalization often add to these tensions, which have always been in the background.

Take the immigration. The security and wealth of liberal democratic societies makes them “magnet” for people from less fortunate parts of the world who escape poverty and violence, which have been inevitable for most of human history.

Both humanitarianism and freedom of movement are essential liberal values; recognition of the equal human value of all persons, regardless of race or ethnic affiliation, is one of the greatest achievements of modern liberalisation. Liberal democracy in the United States is in particular built on the idea of America as a country built by immigrants, and a home for freedom and opportunity seekers from around the world.

However, you don't need to be overwhelmed by a racist background fear, to think that under certain circumstances, immigration especially, such as the one in Germany in 2015, a massive influx of immigrants who cannot easily adapt to the social and cultural norms of the host country, can have devastating effects, and cause dangerous social tensions, which are not born simply because of nativistic prejudices.

Especially in Europe, debates on immigration often oppose citizens who believe they should have a voice in policies affecting their lives towards elites, who believe that human rights have priority over popular will. This leads to what Monk calls “undemocratic liberalism”, which comes as a predictable response that has empowered populists across the continent, with Victor Orban in Hungary as the best-known representative.

In the United States, divisive lines often include the role of religion and the pace of social change. Part of the strongest support for President Trump comes from the gospels, who believe their rights are under the attack of modern American culture.

One might ridicule some of their complaints as a right-wing version of victimization policy. At the same time, the reproductive freedom for women, the marriage rights for homosexuals and lesbians, and the civil rights for transgenerative people all areas in which liberalisation has achieved admirable successes can raise really difficult issues of religious freedom for those who follow traditional beliefs about sexuality and gender.

Meanwhile, on the left, internal liberalisation conflicts have escalated into identity wars, and in what Sohab Ahmar calls non-liberalism “libral”. One of the greatest achievements of Western liberalisation of the 20th century was the extension of the promise of civil and social equality for previous disfellowshipped groups: women, racial minorities and finally homosexuals.

In recent years, in part because of dissatisfaction with cultural differences, the drive for equality has turned into what critics say is its opposite: a movement of social justice, which determines people only by their identity, and promotes an opposite hierarchy, in which status depends on “the extent of the printing”.

With its focus on changing attitudes and rooting out delicate prejudices, this movement has also clashed with one of the most fundamental values of liberalisation - freedom of speech. Today's progressives argue more and more that the First Amendment's protection of free expression is described as humiliating to marginalised people to continue printing and damaging the weak.

Old liberal values like artistic freedom are fading due to concerns about cultural imperialism. Opposition to “political correctability” and anxiety over violations of religious freedom have both contributed to Donald Trump's election president. And there are certainly other factors that have led to the current crisis from the catastrophic failures of foreign policy to the social media revolution.

Together, all these factors contribute to a cynicism toward a liberal system that, despite tensions that have not been resolved, has served the Western nations well. From Hungary to the Belt Belt Belt Belt, conservatives are increasingly embracing a vision of society, based on the right of birth in the country, and not on common values.

Meanwhile, many progressives at the “social justice camp” argue that traditional liberalisation is “and this” is hopelessly due to racism and other pressures. These are not signs that liberal democracy is a failure, only that many people are rejecting the standards, which are still essential to a good society.

This is not the first time some have declared the death of liberal democracy. “Democracy, may at the last be a historic accident, a brief pretensis closing in front of our eyes” - warned French intellectual Jean-Francois Revel in the book “How democracies” disappear, published in 1983.

At the time, the threat was what he saw as the inability of democracy to resist in an effective way the communist expansion. Eight years later, the Soviet Union had collapsed. Perhaps in another quarter of the century, the current panic over endangered liberalisation will seem exaggerated. But to overcome the crisis, we must face the self-blown tendencies of liberalism, curb its arrogance, and re-discover the virtues of genuine humility and pluralism. /In Albanian from the World.al