12-14-2003, 09:03 PM
"Japan was a thriving democracy for 50 years before Perry showed up in 1856? It was a Shogunate then, not quite a democracy.
I was talking about occupied Japan after WWII, not medieval Japan opening up to the world. I presumed that was the reference when people started talking about spreading democracy by force. Ditto with Germany post '46. Indeed, in Germany, one might find a couple of thoroughly failed models for imposing some kind of democracy from outside. The Weimar Republic? Spectacular failure. The Confederacy of the Rhine? Talk about your basic puppet government, but it was at least nominally an attempt to "export" the French revolution. And, of course, it failed horribly, and the people went right back to trying to make a Germany *their* way.
Did I say "thriving democracy" for Germany and Japan? (flip flip flip) No, I didn't. I said self-attained democratic traditions. Neither country was the model of the empowerment of the people. But both were miles ahead of where Iraq has ever been before. A parliament, to counterbalance the power of a monarch, gives the people some feeling of participation, or at least of a plurality of powers. It's a huge step from having only one, totally non-representative focus of power. Sometimes it's little more than a terrible joke, (see: Tsarist Russia) but even then it's a joke people can draw on for an image of their future, something that's genuinely theirs.
Democracy is not the antithesis of militarism. Britain, while remaining one of the most fully functioning democracies in the world, conquered an Empire around the world. I'm not a big fan of military expansion, Japanese or no, but that doesn't mean they didn't have a parliament. God only knows the US has had its hand in plenty of cookie jars, notably in Latin America, but that doesn't nullify your democracy.
An Emperor can be anything from an autocrat to window dressing. That Japan had one does not mean it didn't also have the idea of democracy. Again, definitely not the textbook case of perfect democracy. But something, a lot more than Iraq has/has ever had.
But hey, hope for the future. Maybe with the big man gone, Iraqis will tell both the old Baathists and Washington to get lost, and build a real functioning Arab democracy on their own. That would be something to drink to.
Jester
I was talking about occupied Japan after WWII, not medieval Japan opening up to the world. I presumed that was the reference when people started talking about spreading democracy by force. Ditto with Germany post '46. Indeed, in Germany, one might find a couple of thoroughly failed models for imposing some kind of democracy from outside. The Weimar Republic? Spectacular failure. The Confederacy of the Rhine? Talk about your basic puppet government, but it was at least nominally an attempt to "export" the French revolution. And, of course, it failed horribly, and the people went right back to trying to make a Germany *their* way.
Did I say "thriving democracy" for Germany and Japan? (flip flip flip) No, I didn't. I said self-attained democratic traditions. Neither country was the model of the empowerment of the people. But both were miles ahead of where Iraq has ever been before. A parliament, to counterbalance the power of a monarch, gives the people some feeling of participation, or at least of a plurality of powers. It's a huge step from having only one, totally non-representative focus of power. Sometimes it's little more than a terrible joke, (see: Tsarist Russia) but even then it's a joke people can draw on for an image of their future, something that's genuinely theirs.
Democracy is not the antithesis of militarism. Britain, while remaining one of the most fully functioning democracies in the world, conquered an Empire around the world. I'm not a big fan of military expansion, Japanese or no, but that doesn't mean they didn't have a parliament. God only knows the US has had its hand in plenty of cookie jars, notably in Latin America, but that doesn't nullify your democracy.
An Emperor can be anything from an autocrat to window dressing. That Japan had one does not mean it didn't also have the idea of democracy. Again, definitely not the textbook case of perfect democracy. But something, a lot more than Iraq has/has ever had.
But hey, hope for the future. Maybe with the big man gone, Iraqis will tell both the old Baathists and Washington to get lost, and build a real functioning Arab democracy on their own. That would be something to drink to.
Jester