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Here is a list [1] of current authoritarian regimes. There is a pattern or rather multiple patterns. They're poor, hostile and struggling in all aspects (pick y

Here is a list [1] of current authoritarian regimes. There is a pattern or rather multiple patterns. They're poor, hostile and struggling in all aspects (pick your favorite ranking metric) with only one exception - Singapore. The world doesn't need authoritarianism. Human psyche, at the top and at the bottom of the societal hierarchy is fragile and barbaric without education, science and free thought. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authoritarianism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authoritarianism

paraditedc 8y ago
> They're poor, hostile and struggling in all aspects (pick your favorite ranking metric) with only one exception - Singapore. What about Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and more notably Russia and China? I don't think any of them qualify as poor and struggling? Also, causation and correlation. Poverty might be related to authoritarian, but not necessarily caused by it. For example, many counties are poor because of colonialism and the political vacuum left over when they gained independence. In addition, looking at stats in this way is prone to sampling bias. If you take a look at the list of non authoritarian counties, many of them might not be necessarily doing better.
- uw_rob 8y ago
  > Poverty might be related to authoritarian, but not necessarily caused by it. There are some good arguments for why it might be the cause of it. A book I really enjoyed on this subject is called "The Dictator's Handbook". One of the arguments in the book is that in dictatorships, the rulers have much less need to please ordinary people, and they are better off utilizing their available resources to enrich themselves and buy loyalty from other powerful players. If they are not able to gain loyalty from other powerful players they risk a coup. Where as in democratic societies, the leaders need to please the people, otherwise they risk losing power by being voted out. A reasonable explanation for the few authoritarian counties that do not have poor and struggling populations is that they have an outside player that is threatening them. In these cases, they have demands for something more than what they can bully out of their populations. So you are going to see widespread education, and ideally, prosperity. This gives them advanced military technology and economic power. I am likely doing the book injustice in my representation of it, but it is able to provide a very solid argument for the above being true. Both from an analytical perspective, as well as a historical one.
- throwawayepgpp 8y ago
  Saudi Arabia and Qatar have a notable underclass that's pretty much for all intents and purpose slave labor. Russia's living conditions improved but you're still in for a big surprise once you step outside of Moscow or St-Petersburg. The average (or more accurately, median) Russian or Chinese is not an affluent middle-class urban dweller posting loftily about the downfall of the West, they're a rural worker living under what would be considered miserable conditions in any Western country. It's almost as if authoritarian rule was inefficient and wasteful in resources due to having to spend most of its energy staying in power and favoring corruption and political favoritism at the expense of good policies. Sure you may offset that with incredible amounts of natural resources (oil and large territory) but inequality does not go away. Also, sooner or later natural resources run out.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
tonylinn80 8y ago
Plenty of democratic countries are also poor, hostile and struggling in all aspects. China, for example, are doing much better overall compared to democratic India, and arguably Taiwan at this point. India has been democratic since long time ago, but the government had been heavily corrupted. Little improvements can be done under their democratic system. Taiwan basically entered a downward spiral in all aspects since it fully adopted democracy. The recent elections are full of shit shows like that in US. People are getting more and more angry with their government. If Singapore and China were operating under a democratic government like US, there's no way they can achieve what they achieved so far, and they'd probably be just irrelevant right now.
- throwawayepgpp 8y ago
  China is doing well, really? Are you ignoring the literal billion of people living below the most abject standards for poverty in the West, or do you just think people outside cities don't exist?
  - paraditedc 8y ago
    I don't know where you got your stats from, but Wikipedia says otherwise. In the most strict definition of poor (living under 1.90USD a day), only 0.7% of Chinese are poor. Even if you go up to 3.20USD per day, it's still only 7%, way less than billion. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_percentage_of_population_living_in_poverty https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_percent...

paraditedc 8y ago

> They're poor, hostile and struggling in all aspects (pick your favorite ranking metric) with only one exception - Singapore. What about Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and more notably Russia and China? I don't think any of them qualify as poor and struggling? Also, causation and correlation. Poverty might be related to authoritarian, but not necessarily caused by it. For example, many counties are poor because of colonialism and the political vacuum left over when they gained independence. In addition, looking at stats in this way is prone to sampling bias. If you take a look at the list of non authoritarian counties, many of them might not be necessarily doing better.

uw_rob 8y ago
> Poverty might be related to authoritarian, but not necessarily caused by it. There are some good arguments for why it might be the cause of it. A book I really enjoyed on this subject is called "The Dictator's Handbook". One of the arguments in the book is that in dictatorships, the rulers have much less need to please ordinary people, and they are better off utilizing their available resources to enrich themselves and buy loyalty from other powerful players. If they are not able to gain loyalty from other powerful players they risk a coup. Where as in democratic societies, the leaders need to please the people, otherwise they risk losing power by being voted out. A reasonable explanation for the few authoritarian counties that do not have poor and struggling populations is that they have an outside player that is threatening them. In these cases, they have demands for something more than what they can bully out of their populations. So you are going to see widespread education, and ideally, prosperity. This gives them advanced military technology and economic power. I am likely doing the book injustice in my representation of it, but it is able to provide a very solid argument for the above being true. Both from an analytical perspective, as well as a historical one.
throwawayepgpp 8y ago
Saudi Arabia and Qatar have a notable underclass that's pretty much for all intents and purpose slave labor. Russia's living conditions improved but you're still in for a big surprise once you step outside of Moscow or St-Petersburg. The average (or more accurately, median) Russian or Chinese is not an affluent middle-class urban dweller posting loftily about the downfall of the West, they're a rural worker living under what would be considered miserable conditions in any Western country. It's almost as if authoritarian rule was inefficient and wasteful in resources due to having to spend most of its energy staying in power and favoring corruption and political favoritism at the expense of good policies. Sure you may offset that with incredible amounts of natural resources (oil and large territory) but inequality does not go away. Also, sooner or later natural resources run out.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

tonylinn80 8y ago

Plenty of democratic countries are also poor, hostile and struggling in all aspects. China, for example, are doing much better overall compared to democratic India, and arguably Taiwan at this point. India has been democratic since long time ago, but the government had been heavily corrupted. Little improvements can be done under their democratic system. Taiwan basically entered a downward spiral in all aspects since it fully adopted democracy. The recent elections are full of shit shows like that in US. People are getting more and more angry with their government. If Singapore and China were operating under a democratic government like US, there's no way they can achieve what they achieved so far, and they'd probably be just irrelevant right now.

throwawayepgpp 8y ago
China is doing well, really? Are you ignoring the literal billion of people living below the most abject standards for poverty in the West, or do you just think people outside cities don't exist?
- paraditedc 8y ago
  I don't know where you got your stats from, but Wikipedia says otherwise. In the most strict definition of poor (living under 1.90USD a day), only 0.7% of Chinese are poor. Even if you go up to 3.20USD per day, it's still only 7%, way less than billion. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_percentage_of_population_living_in_poverty https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_percent...