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The Despot's Accomplice
Book

The Despot's Accomplice

How the West Is Aiding and Abetting the Decline of Democracy

Brian Klaas
Oxford UP, 2017
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Editorial Rating

8

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Recommendation

Brian Klaas of the London School of Economics believes in the transformative power of democracy. In this comprehensive book, he offers prescriptions for Western powers seeking to spread political freedom and critiques many of the halfhearted pro-democracy efforts of recent decades. The United States’ recent misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan chastened many who once espoused nation-building. But Klaas argues ceasing to promote democracy is a mistake. In addition to offering insights and examples gleaned from his global travels to investigate pseudo-democracies, Klaas also explores America itself, taking the US tradition of gerrymandering to task. At times, Klaas’s crusade seems a bit too idealistic, but, ultimately, he makes a passionate and persuasive case for trying to expand democracy’s shrinking reach.

Summary

Democracy Retreats

Democracy gained momentum worldwide after the fall of the Soviet Union in December, 1991. But the spread of democracy ceased in 2006, and political freedom beat a slow but sure retreat as the United States and other Western democracies failed to promote global democracy effectively in the years that followed. The promise of the Arab Spring and Western interventions in Libya, Afghanistan and Iraq disappointed. Violence and disorder, rather than burgeoning democracy, replaced former iron-fisted but stable regimes. Now the West finds itself afflicted with “democracy promotion fatigue.” Meanwhile, the election of Donald Trump and British voters’ approval of Brexit have skeptics wondering whether democracy really yields the wisest decisions.

As democracy loses momentum, some in the West argue that the United States should get out of the state-building business altogether and treat all nations equally, regardless of their system of government. Another school of thought makes a distinction between dictators who support US interests and those who...

About the Author

Brian Klaas is a fellow in comparative politics at the London School of Economics. A native of Minnesota, he received his doctorate from the University of Oxford.

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