Human rights are a sensitive subject for most people, especially since democracy is relatively fragile given centuries of totalitarianism and military regimes.
It took hundreds of years to educate the political class and to reformulate the social reality in the direction of supporting human rights, but this must be followed carefully, especially in areas where democracy is not at home.
To understand what vulnerabilities democracy has, we will start from the quote of the founding father of the USA, Thomas Jefferson: “When government fears the people, there is freedom. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny.”
Today weaknesses are the tomorrow democracy problems
Democracy has a big vulnerability – fear. When people are afraid, all their rights, even those of life, can be taken away. This fact was confirmed in World War II by the people who refused to oppose the totalitarian regime brought by Hitler because they were afraid for their lives. Similarly was the Stalin communist regime, in which people did not oppose the regime out of the fear of dying despite the fact that their rights were taken away, sometimes together with the right to live. A similar example was in Romania during the Ceausescu regime where the people were afraid of losing their lives. In this way, governments came to make decisions that no longer took into account the needs and desires of citizens but only the interests of the rulers.
Democracy and fear
But for those regimes to get at that point to be called totalitarian regimes, it was necessary at some point for them to be supported by people. Out of fear of famine and enslavement for the lives of the Germans, the people supported Hitler’s regime along with his reform project. Stalin was also supported by his people for fear of war and Hitler’s failure to carry out his plan.
In Romania, at the beginning of Ceausescu’s regime, the Romanian society was delighted with the good things that were happening, especially about the improvement of Romania’s image in the international arena. However, because Ceausescu admired the leadership regime in China and North Korea much more than what he saw in Western Europe, he applied the model of leadership the Asian states advertised.
Therefore, the fear and admiration of people for a system of government can easily encourage the transformation of a democratic regime into a totalitarian one if the population does not follow closely the political decisions if it does not think about the political goals and the subsequent consequences of some political decisions.
Suppressing democracy through fear. The Chinese model of government during the Covid19 Pandemics
This is what is currently happening in China. With the pandemic, people’s fear and reluctance to plead for their cause has led the Chinese authorities to suppress freedom of expression in a harsh way. In this pandemic year, Chinese totalitarianism has intensified in the online environment where censorship, content blocking, information distortion, etc. by the Chinese government have been an intense practice. Moreover, the use of words such as “constitutional democracy”, “freedom”, “democracy”, “government” and “totalitarianism” is not allowed on social media, says The China Human Rights Lawyers Group.
Follow your cause to the end
What we want to say is that although we are going through very difficult times as humanity, we must keep an eye on our governments and not give up our rights for which we have fought for thousands of years. If the actions taken by governments cease to serve the interests of the citizens – which is why governments have been made – people must take immediate action and not allow the loss of thousands of years of struggle for human rights in a momentary political decision.
Sources:
The China Human Rights Lawyers Group, 2021. Better to Die for One’s Words Than Survive on Silence: A New Year Statement by The China Human Rights Lawyers Group, in China Change. Available at: https://chinachange.org/2020/12/31/better-to-die-for-ones-words-than-survive-on-silence-a-new-year-statement-by-the-china-human-rights-lawyers-group/
Monticello, 2020. Brief Biography of Thomas Jefferson. In Monticelo.org. Available at: https://www.monticello.org/thomas-jefferson/brief-biography-of-jefferson/
Bianca Pădurean, 2019. Pagina de istorie: Cum a venit Ceaușescu la putere. In RFI Romania. Available at: https://www.rfi.ro/politica-110157-pagina-de-istorie-venit-ceausescu-putere