Introduction

Summary

The title of this volume, Democracy in a Russian Mirror, and the motivation behind it call for an explanation.

We are going through times when the value, the feasibility, and the prospects of democracy are under intense scrutiny in different parts of the world.

1. Several aspects of the functioning of democracies in the West are currently a source of intense dissatisfaction among their citizens. There is widespread dissatisfaction that democracy seems unable to generate equality in the socioeconomic realm, to make people feel that their political participation is effective, to ensure that governments what they are supposed to do and not what they are not mandated to do, and to balance public order and noninterference in private lives. Indeed, at one time, we thought that the title of the book should be “Really Existing Democracies.”

2. In turn, governments and their ideologues in many nondemocratic countries claim that although democracy is a universal value, it does not have to assume the same forms as democracies in the West. Different projects of “Non-Western democracy” claim that the “essence” of democracy is “the unity of the government and the governed” (a phrase coined by Carl Schmitt) and that the existence of political opposition and the institution of choosing governments through elections are not necessary for democracy. In such views, the form of democracy must depend on cultural traditions, or at least some countries are “not yet ready” for democracy in the Western sense.

These debates pose several general questions about democracy, the paths to it, and the paths away from it:

1. Must some “prerequisites,” cultural or material, be fulfilled for democracy to become possible?

2. If democracy can be established only under some conditions, are these conditions sufficient for democracy to emerge?

3. Is the “strong state” a prerequisite for democracy or an obstacle to it?

4. Are democratic reforms from above credible, or must the impetus come from below?

5. […]