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For all the faults of American governance, it is extremely resistant to authoritarianism. There is currently an American president openly trying to have the ele

For all the faults of American governance, it is extremely resistant to authoritarianism. There is currently an American president openly trying to have the election rigged and he has a pile of people behind him. And despite having a majority in one legislative house, despite appointing tons of the judges, and despite having the ability to ruin the careers of numerous state legislators and executives, he is almost certainly going to fail. There have been plenty of attempts to imprison people on a whim in the USA and while they have succeeded for a period, they tend not to survive long term either.

happytoexplain 6y ago
I have this same thought a lot - even though Trump highlighted the fact a lot of our governance practices are simply norms rather than being enforceable, he also demonstrated that our system is actually pretty resilient to raw evil. Despite his constantly talking about wanting to do dictator-like things, and frequently trying to, he was never really able to in practice (though there are a couple arguable counter examples - one particular usage of police violence springs to mind).
hangonhn 6y ago
Alexis De Tocqueville in his book "Democracy in America" identified one of the foundations of American democracy is our social mores. A lot of the reasons why the judiciaries appointed by him didn't go along with his blatant attempts to undermine the election has to do with their values and believes. I'm not trying to say Americans are somehow better people than others but want to point out the important role unwritten rules and social norms have in our governance. Quite a few countries have tried to establish their government along the same lines as the US, UK, etc. but failed even though their structure is similar to ours and I think a lot of it has to do with what sorts of values people have and hold onto. In fact, the UK has even more unwritten rules than the US -- they lack a constitution but still functions well as a democracy. Pre-WWII Japan copied their government from the UK and it ended up more or less a military state.

happytoexplain 6y ago

I have this same thought a lot - even though Trump highlighted the fact a lot of our governance practices are simply norms rather than being enforceable, he also demonstrated that our system is actually pretty resilient to raw evil. Despite his constantly talking about wanting to do dictator-like things, and frequently trying to, he was never really able to in practice (though there are a couple arguable counter examples - one particular usage of police violence springs to mind).

hangonhn 6y ago

Alexis De Tocqueville in his book "Democracy in America" identified one of the foundations of American democracy is our social mores. A lot of the reasons why the judiciaries appointed by him didn't go along with his blatant attempts to undermine the election has to do with their values and believes. I'm not trying to say Americans are somehow better people than others but want to point out the important role unwritten rules and social norms have in our governance. Quite a few countries have tried to establish their government along the same lines as the US, UK, etc. but failed even though their structure is similar to ours and I think a lot of it has to do with what sorts of values people have and hold onto. In fact, the UK has even more unwritten rules than the US -- they lack a constitution but still functions well as a democracy. Pre-WWII Japan copied their government from the UK and it ended up more or less a military state.