Will All Nations Be Secular Democracies?
- Jia Han
- Jul 28, 2024
- 4 min read
One critical debate in political science, political philosophy, and international relations is whether or not changes show historical directions. One may consider whether or not some events repeat, rhyme, or progress toward some direction. The view here is from a grand view, not daily, yearly, even centuries changes. Let us consider one example. Aristotle’s classic Politics, although written more than two thousand years ago, is still largely applicable to today’s world. In the last two centuries plus this theme has been shaped by Hegel’s philosophy. Bryan Magee, the editor of a philosophy magazine, interviewed today’s leading scholars and asked them to comment on great philosophers in history [1]. According to [1], among modern philosophers German philosopher Georg Hegel (and Karl Marx who distorted Hegel’s work) has the strongest impact on our life. Another key topic is whether or not we can achieve perpetual peace worldwide. German philosopher Immanuel Kant’s work, Perpetual Peace [2], had a strong influence on this thesis. The above two are somewhat related. Both of them are wrong or impractical. In this write-up, I will address the first topic and leave the second topic in the future.
You might have heard The End of History by Francis Fukuyama [3]. Fukuyama’s work was based on French philosopher of Russian descent Alexandre Kojève’s interpretation of Hegel’s philosophy. An overview of Hegel’s philosophy and historical progress of various civilizations is given by Peter Singer [4]. ([5] is a brief account of a relevant chapter of this book and its applications to Chinese civilization.) Singer’s book is excellent yet accessible. It should be mentioned that controversies on this aspect of Hegel’s philosophy still exist. A noted philosopher Roger Scruton challenged the approach using spiritual movement to interpret human society evolution [6]. Scruton has a point. Nevertheless, I think that Singer’s expositions are broadly correct, although they should be revised (the details are well beyond this write-up). This is in part because [6] is a collection of commentaries not a research paper.
The End of History theory concludes that all polities will evolve into liberal democracies. Initially, I accepted Fukuyama’s rationale wholeheartedly. When studying democratic transitions in the real world, I encountered difficulties. Initially all polities (communities with political orders) are based on religions. I now quote observations of renowned scholars. Prominent Middle-East historian Bernard Lewis observed: “The older religions of mankind were all related to — were in a sense a part of — authority, whether of the tribe, the city, or the king. The cult provided a visible symbol of group identity and loyalty; the faith provided sanction for the ruler and his laws.”[7] In a prior write-up, I quoted Mark Lilla, The Stillborn God. The book notes: “When we cast our eyes over human history, we see that every civilization known to us has been founded on religion, not on philosophy. In healthy societies, religion has helped to forge the social bond and encouraged sacrifice for the good.”[8] If you compare these two quotes, you might see the chasm between religio-political entities and irreligious polities which most modern nation-states are. In fact, the whole book The Stillborn God studies the various paths from religio-politico societies to irreligious modern polities in the West from the philosophical-theological viewpoint. At the end of the book, it states “… Time and again we must remind ourselves that we are living an experiment, that we are the exceptions. We have little reason to expect other civilizations to follow our unusual path, which was opened up by a unique theological-political crisis within Christendom. This does not mean that other civilizations necessarily lack the resources for creating a workable political order; it does mean that they will have to find the theological resources within their traditions to make that happen. Our challenge is different. We have made a choice that is at once simpler and harder: … ”[9]. I hope you can see the fundamental conflicts between Fukuyama’s The End of History hypothesis and Lilla’s conclusion. One claims universality of all civilizations and the other the exceptionalism of the West. Lilla’s work should have more weight since its study is from a grand scale. It covers philosophy and some theological development in Western thought throughout the last four hundred years, including Kant and Hegel.
In fact, even before I came to The Stillborn God, I had already realized that religion can be a big problem when studying democratic transitions in a non-Western civilization. The present common approach removes the most critical factor (religion) before the studies even begin. I have written a series of short articles on different civilizations [10-13]. They are crude. At that time, I imagine that somewhere and sometime we can remove or reduce the effects of religion. The more I study, the more I think that this is a dead end. This should have profound impacts on political philosophy and world order.
References:
[1] Bryan Magee, "The Great Philosophers: An Introduction to Western Philosophy," Oxford Paperbacks; 2nd edition, 2001.
[2] Immanuel Kant, Perpetual Peace, FQ Classics, 2007.
[3] Francis Fukuyama, "The End of History and the Last Man," Free Press, February, 2006.
[4] Peter Singer, “Hegel: A Very Short Introduction,” Oxford University Press; Revised ed., 2001.
[6] Roger Scruton, The Uses of Pessimism: And the Danger of False Hope, Oxford University, 2010.
[7] Bernard Lewis, "What Went Wrong?: The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East," Harper Perennial, 2003, p.96.
[8] Mark Lilla, 2008, The Stillborn God: Religion, Politics, and the Modern West, Vintage, 2008, pp.219-220
[9] Mark Lilla, 2008, The Stillborn God: Religion, Politics, and the Modern West, Vintage, 2008, p.308.
[13] 韩家亮：民主与中华文明 http://hx.cnd.org/?p=20179
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