Slavery Demonstrates the Power of Democracy
Am I the only person that finds this juxtaposition jarring?:Allies like Virginia Republican Sen. George Allen say Rice will preview the theme of Bush's inaugural address -- spreading democracy around the world.
And they say Rice's personal story of growing up in the segregated South will help her carry that banner on the world stage.
As the American example of three and a half centuries of slavery and Jim Crow clearly demonstrate, democracy produces justice everywhere it flourishes. I like democracy as much as the next American, but (as I think segregation makes clear) anyone who thinks it fixes all humanities problems is fooling themselves.
posted by Michael Benson @ 10:31 AM
1 Comments:
I'm also a grad student in history, and I read your blog all the time. You guys are great: "fair and balanced," which can be quite refreshing.
Just an idea: do you think it's sheer coincidence that abolitionism became a movement in Europe, British America, and Spanish America at the same time that liberal ideas (including democracy) began to take hold? Slavery was abolished all throughout Latin America with independence and the spread of liberal democratic ideas. In the US, slavery and slaves proved to be a sticky mess at the Constitutional Convention, and it was a constant source of legal ambiguity and tension throughout the antebellum period. Maybe democracy didn't "solve" slavery (civil war did that), but I do think that democracy created an ideological/social organization that made it impossible for slavery to ever exist comfortably. Oil and water. In an ancien regime society of aristocrats and commoners, the notion that some human beings are innately inferior and born to serve can thrive. But in a society clamoring for "liberty" and "democracy," and claiming that "all men are created equal?" Never. Slavery was always doomed as soon as liberal democratic principles were adopted. The only question was how long it would survive, how long people would tolerate such an antidemocratic institution in a democratic country. The same argument could be made regarding universal suffrage. (I know I sound like I believe in Progress...but I don't, really...)
At the same time, your main point is still true. If Bush thinks that the Afghan/Iraqi democracy-through-occupation model will solve all the world's ills, then he's as simpleminded as the press makes him out to be.
Keep up the good work!
Gonzalo
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