Environment Politics and Technology Nations

Politics Not Immune to Impacts of 21st Century Disruptive Change – The Rise of Extremism and Strongmen

May 26, 2016

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May 26, 2016 – If Donald Trump is elected President of the United States this fall it represents a disturbingly consistent trend. Disruptive change has become the norm of the 21st century and it goes beyond science and technological innovation. In the United States disruptive change is destabilizing large social groups who find adapting to this century a very difficult prospect. Disruptive change may be the reason for the rise of Donald Trump.

Extreme leaders tend to arise from destabilizing circumstances. Trump is not alone. Last week The Philippines elected Rodrigo Duterte, known by his followers by the name Duterte Harry (Dirty Harry). Duterte is a take no prisoners politician who believes in practicing “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” He has been called the punisher by his supporters.

Another one is Narendra Modi, the Hindu strongman elected to lead India in 2014. Modi plays the race card and uses xenophobia to ensure his popularity.

In Hungary, Viktor Orban was recntly elected to head a right wing government that has been a leading anti-refugee voice in Europe. Austria just dodged the bullet this week in its election with the leader of the right wing party falling short by 1% in securing control of that country.

What is fueling a return to the political extremism that the world saw in the Europe of the 1920s and 30s when Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler succeeded in becoming leaders of essentially democratic countries?

Although Mussolini marched on Rome to achieve his seizure of government, it was quickly blessed by the more conservative leaders within Italy and thus validated. Hitler, on the other hand, won at the polls gathering a national following that led to a near majority.

The pattern of the 20th century appears to be repeating itself in the 21st. Some of the reasons are the same but many are quite different. Here are a few:

Disruptive innovation and technological change is altering work and impacting those with the fewest skills and least education. For these groups unemployment is becoming epidemic.
International human rights as professed by United Nations is seen as a threat to nations and those who in the past have enjoyed positions of privilege within their borders.
The rise of the Internet and mobile communications is breaking down human barriers. National boundaries are getting softer. Assimilating readily available information is seen by many nations and societies as a threat.
Inter-generational transition is proving a tough challenge as global demographics alter with an imbalance on a scale never seen before between young and old. Young people are threatened by the lack of opportunity and uncertainty.
Regional conflicts, economic disruption and climate change are fueling mass migration from failing states to nations more characteristically non-diverse.
Supra-national trade agreements have altered global economics moving jobs from high-labour cost, high regulated countries to low-labour cost, low regulated ones.
Muilti-national corporations appear less subject to the laws of the nations from which they originate.
A widening wealth gap between super rich and the rest of the planet is fueling a movement to address income disparity.
Future climate change over and above what we have experienced is unhinging many within societies who fear either actions or inaction.

All of the above speak to the same basic emotions: fear, insecurity, envy and frustration. These are the fuels that produce a social desire for strong alpha leaders seen as capable of righting the wrongs, real or perceived.

Donald Trump is the perfect remedy in the minds of many when he talks of making America great again, suggesting that the United States is in some sort of national decline.

Trump is not alone in his strongman appeal. Vladimir Putin is as Trumpian when he reasserts Russian imperialism in places like Crimea, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Ukraine while ignoring a failing economy and the duress it places on Russian lives. Xi Jinping in China deflects criticism of wholesale government corruption by distractive appeals to Chinese nationalism as he builds artificial islands in the South China Sea and populates them with missiles and military to defend them from neighbours attempting to assert their own maritime boundary claims. Viktor Orban strings barbed wire across his country’s borders to block refugees attempting to find new homes in Europe citing “Hungary is for Hungarians.” Orban uses the old message of blaming outsiders for keeping Hungary from becoming great once again. And then there is Reccep Erdogan in Turkey who finds ways to subvert its democracy as duly elected President. Erdogan uses the Kurdish minority as his whipping boy both within the country and in neighbouring states to rally the majority of Turks to his Greater Turkey ambitions.

But no one plays the strongman trump card these days better than the man named Trump. He offers simple, asinine solutions to complex problems. Tweets and one liners replace well thought out policy. He encourages followers to manhandle protesters at rallies because he can’t punch their lights out. He promises a wall on the Mexican border to keep thousands of non-existent crossers from entering the United States and claims he will get the Mexicans to pay for it. He threatens to rip up all existing international trade deals, practice his “art of the deal” in international negotiations, and get the Chinese to stop stealing jobs and the wealth of America. He wants to give nuclear weapons to allies to defend themselves. He threatens to kill international treaties unless allies pony up more money. He wants a ban on Muslims entering the United States. He intends to deport all undocumented immigrants numbering in the tens of millions. This way he will bring a new world order into fruition.

If history has taught us anything, no strongman limits his or her reach to national boundaries. The undercurrent of threats and the feeding of fear and xenophobia eventually goes international. For Hitler the solution to Germany was also a new world order with “lebensraum” and genocide as instruments to assert national will. For Putin, Xi and Erdogan, so far their incursions on the international scene have remained small. But they too seek a new world or regional hegemonic order.

How will it manifest with Trump in The White House? After the smoke of domestic violence clears with racial unrest and mass deportations, what price will the rest of the world have to pay for what the feat of disruptive change has spawned?