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Taiwan stands forfreedom, transparency, accountability, and other democratic characteristics that clearly differentiate the island nation from China.

Taiwans commitment to cultivating a free economy and a vibrant civil society through independent democratic institutions has unambiguously made the country a notable example for Asia and the world in terms of how an emerging country can move progressively into new chapters of development.

Taiwanranked sixth in The Heritage Foundations newly released 2022Index of Economic Freedom.

The index assesses the economies of 184 countries based on 12 indicators of economic freedomfrom property rights to financial freedom. These indicators are grouped into four categories: rule of law, limited government, regulatory efficiency, and market openness.

With its overall score improving by 1.5 points to 80.1, Taiwan achieved the status of the economically free category in the index for the first time.

As the 2022 index notes, Taiwan is one of the few countries in the world to have experienced continuous economic growth during the past five years. Economic freedom has increased significantly during that period as well.

Also notable is that Taiwan recently ranked as the eighth most vibrantdemocracyin the world, according to the Economist Intelligence Units latestDemocracy Index, which is based on five key metrics: electoral process and pluralism, functioning of government, political participation, political culture, and civil liberties. In 2020, Taiwan, along with Japan and South Korea, moved up a category from flawed democracies to full democracies.

Indeed, Taiwans proven track record of being a free, vibrant member of free market democracy is not only remarkable, but also should be further enhanced through pragmatic, strategic partnerships with the United States and other like-minded, willing countries around the world.

Taiwans economic and political transformations are far more than domestic successes. They have fundamentally altered Taipeis relationship with Beijing, with Washington, and with the world. Unambiguously, Taiwans embrace of a free market democracy shows a better path for all the Chinese people.

Taiwan has demonstrated to the world that freedom is a stabilizing force, that free enterprise, free association, and free speech lead to entrepreneurship, prosperity, and security. That is precisely whyTaiwan mattersto the world more than ever. As former Secretary of State Mike Pompeounderscored, Taiwan is a democratic success story, a reliable partner, and a force for good in the world.

Indeed, history reminds us that allies and partners are critical to winning any global fight, particularly when members of the free world are facing increasing challenges from authoritarianism. Nations sharing the values of freedom, a rock-solid commitment to preserving rules-based order, and a deep-seated desire to preserve and advance those democratic values are natural partners and allies.

From a broader, long-term foreign policy perspective, Americas interests in Asia require more than soaring rhetoric and frequent meetings. They require action.

According to Washingtons latestIndo-Pacific Strategydocument, Chinas coercion and aggression spans the globe, but it is most acute in the Indo-Pacific. To achieve a more free and open region, the documentpoints outthat the U.S. will build coalitions by deepening treaty alliances and strengthening relationships with leading partners such as Taiwan, New Zealand, and Singapore.

The strategy paper furthernotesthat it is in the interest of America to ensure an environment in which Taiwans future is determined peacefully in accordance with the wishes and best interests of Taiwans people.

Toward that end, The Heritage Foundation has long called for greater economic interaction and broader dialogue between the U.S. and Taiwan through a bilateral trade and investment pact, which is the logical next step for elevating dynamic economic interaction between the two countries.

In last years Decemberreferendum, the Taiwanese people clearly expressed their determination to engage with the international community, showing that Taiwan is willing to accept international standards and tackle difficult trade issues.

Washington should take note of that. Clearly, starting the process of aU.S.-Taiwan free trade agreementis one worth investing further in over the next decade as well.

Such a practical, more institutionalized economic partnership would reinforce other vital diplomatic links betweenTaiwanand the United States as true partners in the Indo-Pacific region and beyond.

This piece originally appeared in The Daily Signal

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Taiwan's Free and Vibrant Economy Is a Democratic Success Story - Heritage.org

Uttar Pradesh is in political turmoil. There is feverish speculation on the implications of the many defections and realignments that have taken place. Will it severely damage the BJPs electoral juggernaut in 2022? Will it rearrange social communities to the advantage of the Samajwadi Party (SP)? Will the Congresss strategy of reserving 40 per cent tickets for women have an impact on electoral outcomes? Will there be a consolidation of the Muslim vote, especially in eastern UP? Will the farmers movement in western UP revive the fortunes of the RLD? These are some of the important questions being asked about the impact of the churn on electoral outcomes. In this intense debate, one significant aspect of democratic politics seems to have gone largely unnoticed. The assembly election in UP, it appears, has irreversibly changed the party system in UP. It has become more democratic.

There are four aspects to this change. The first is the shift in the party system, which had emerged since 2017, from a one-dominant party system to an alternating two-plus party system. The tea leaves reveal that the BJPs stranglehold on the party system has considerably weakened, particularly with the growth and mobilising power of the challenging parties, especially the SP. An analysis of the party system shows that the BJP now has a credible competitor. The coalitions stitched together by the SP means that it is now able to compete, measure for measure, with the BJP. This can be seen in terms of any of the aspects of what parties do: Recruit leaders, mobilise social groups, transmit demands from below upwards to the party leadership and transmit policies downwards to its supporters, represent the interests of its constituents, organise mass meetings, raise resources, carry out an effective media campaign, and so on. The SP and its allies are successfully performing this role of a political party. By doing so, they have produced in 2022 a shift from a one-dominant party system to what the results will show, irrespective of who wins, an alternating two-plus party system. This change is a huge gain for democracy. Democratic competition will be both more intense, between the two coalitions, and more contained since the coalitions will now have to develop a politics of compromise if they are to retain their appeal to plural constituencies.

The second aspect of the changed party system is the rise of political leaders on whom the parties have become dependent. These are not party functionaries but important politicians within whom the interests of their communities are represented. That is how they are seen by their supporters. YouTube videos affirm this. These leaders should be seen through Edmund Burkes theory on representation, the trustee model, where the representative embodies the interests of their constituents; where he goes, they go. This is legitimate. The bigger parties must, therefore, be flexible enough to accommodate such leaders since they are both individuals and also the embodiments of their communities.

Leaders and parties such as Jayant Chaudharys Rashtriya Lok Dal, or Om Prakash Rajbhars Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party or Keshav Dev Mauryas Mahan Dal or Sanjay Chauhans Janwadi Party (Socialist) or Krishna Patels Apna Dal (Kamerawadi) are examples of this trusteeship model. The BJP too has accepted this new political reality, as can be seen in its alliances with individual-led parties such as the Shoshit Samaj Party, Bharatiya Manav Samaj Party, Musahar Andolan Manch, Manavhit Party, Prithvi Raj Janshakti Party and Bhartiya Samta Samaj Party. The party as an institution has, as a result, become less imposing and less authoritarian because of the many veto points that such leaders occupy. The BJP too is, therefore, compelled to move towards a model of accommodative politics as Vajpayees coalition government had to do. It may lead to the formulation of a Common Minimum Programme (CMP) that guides and binds government decisions. When this happens, the party system in UP will have moved from a politics of imposition, the will of one supremo, to a politics of deliberation, the will of many small supremos, from one Trump to many trumpeters.

The third aspect that follows from this weakening of the BJPs dominance is its inability to control the narrative. Since 2017, the BJP has been setting the terms of the political narrative as was seen in the riots in Muzzafarnagar or on love jihad or on the killing of cattle, etc. This has now changed with an equally robust counter-narrative. The response of Jayant Chaudhary to the BJP leadership in Delhi who sought an alliance with the RLD, asking them to first go to the homes of the 700 people who died in the farmers movement, or of Tikait closing some of his rallies with Har Har Mahadev and Allah hu Akbar, are examples of this counter-discourse. It has acquired traction not just in the physical world but also in the cyber world, countering the BJPs much-vaunted cyber warriors.

While the above three aspects are essentially specific to UP, the fourth has implications for national politics. For the first time in any election, in any significant state, important political leaders are leaving the BJP and joining the Opposition. The significance of this reverse traffic has been glaringly missed. If one had tracked earlier cases of party hopping since the 2014 general elections, one would have noticed that the trend was from other parties to the BJP and not the other way around. Once they joined the BJP, they stayed. This was for a variety of reasons, but mostly out of fear. So, while leaders still cross from other parties to the BJP, in 2022 there has been a significant stream of important leaders exiting the BJP. This is very telling. It indicates that the BJPs formula of holding leaders, through inducements and fear, has been considerably diminished.

Leaders are now not afraid of the BJPs reaction to them leaving. A O Hirschmans classic book Exit, Voice, and Loyalty, on business organisations, provides a good frame from which to view this new development. One had always wondered since 2014, that while exit (leaving the organisation), voice (protesting against the organisations policies) and loyalty (showing support for the organisation) had been features of all other political parties, in the case of the BJP, the feature most visible was loyalty. One saw this most clearly in the behaviour of MPs from UP. They remained silent during the year-long farmers agitation, during the atrocities against Dalits, etc. They showed no exit, no voice, but only loyalty. In the 2022 elections, this has changed. The BJP has to now contend with the new experience of exit and voice. As a result, it has become like any other party. The habit of exit, voice, and loyalty has now been normalised. Three cheers for Indian democracy.

This column first appeared in the print edition on. February 18, 2022 under the title The churn in UP. The writer is D D Kosambi Visiting Professor, Goa University. Views are personal

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The 2022 polls in UP show deepening of democracy - The Indian Express

[Editors Note: This is the eleventh in a series of articles by Ins San Martn exploring the state of the Catholic Church in Pope Francis home continent of Latin America. The tenth can be found here.]

ROSARIO, Argentina This week, the more than 90 prelates pf the Bishops Conference of Colombia held their first meeting of 2022, and discussed the upcoming presidential elections.

Colombians are living a crucial moment in the history of our nation, says the statement. The serious social problems that persist such as inequality, corruption, the devastating action of drug trafficking, poverty and violence call for the strengthening of our democratic system and a common commitment to the integral development of the entire population.

During the four days of work, the prelates listened to the witness of several of their peers who have confirmed to us the dramatic situations that are being experienced in their regions.

One of them was Bishop Rubn Daro Jaramillo of the port city of Buenaventura, who has received several death threats in recent months for denouncing the increased activity of armed groups in the country.

Various illegal actors (ELN guerrillas, FARC dissidents, clan of the Gulf and others) want to take over the territories, forcing internal migration of populations, Bishop Luis Manuel Al, secretary general of the conference and auxiliary bishop of Bogot, told Crux on Thursday. These groups finance themselves through drug trafficking, micro-trafficking and illegal mining, all of these realities that are increasing.

He said the country is currently the scenario of very complex situations of public order, in many regions including Arauca and Tibu, on the border with Venezuela, where criminal gangs of both countries fight over territories where they want to plant illegal crops.

For this reason, we saw a priority to invite all citizens to commit ourselves to the exercise of democracy; and politicians to exercise leadership motivated by the common good and service to the new generations and the poor, said the prelate, who is also a member of the Vaticans Commission for the Protection of Minors.

Bishop Juan Carlos Cardenas of Pasto, a diocese in western Colombia that has many rural territories also coveted by the armed groups, told Crux that the bishops have repeatedly called for the structural problems that perpetuate the evils that systematically afflict the nation to be addressed.

He also sees a need for political leaders to focus on long-term programs rather than on personal confrontations; to dissociate themselves from the cancer of corruption and to think first and foremost about the best interests of the nation and the common good of all Colombians.

As a counterpart, citizens are called to be responsible while exercising their democratic rights, Cardenas said.

Among the topics being put forth by some presidential candidates are abortion and euthanasia, both permitted in Colombia, but with strong restrictions.

St. Paul reminds us that we must preach in season and out of season, with or without opportunity, Cardenas said when asked about these life issues. Beyond such punctual discussions, there is something more fundamental: The relativization of the value of life.

As pastors we cannot remain silent when this fundamental value is called into question: to defend and care for human life in all its stages and situations, he said. Life from the moment it is conceived, and as it is ending. But we are also called to speak up in defense of the right to life of peasants, of ethnic communities, and the life of a citizen that is taken away during a robbery because of a cell phone or a bicycle.

I believe that we must be unconditional missionaries of the gospel of life, Cardenas said.

The bishops assembly also discussed how the national consultation for the Synod of bishops on synodality will be carried out. The theme for the Feb. 14-18 summit was The journey together of the Church in Colombia, and the meeting was lived in a spirit of synodality, listening to one and other, and discerning what the Spirit is saying to our Church, Ali said.

In addition, several Colombian Catholics took part in Novembers Ecclesial Assembly of Latin America, held in Mexico, and their experiences and conclusions were also shared, particularly those of the laity.

One of our priorities for the next triennium is to insist on the effective leadership of the laity in the particular churches, Ali said. For us, the ministry of the catechist is fundamental in so many areas where we do not have ordained ministers. And of course, the vast majority of our catechists are women.

Cardenas agreed on synodality being the spirit of this assembly, arguing that the local bishops have allowed ourselves to be permeated by the popes call to listen.

Beyond responding to the popes call on this road to the universal synod, it is a good exercise for us to renew our episcopal fraternity and collegiality, he said. In this spirit, we would be better set to lead from the experience and the testimony of a Church in Colombia animated by the spirit of the synod.

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Ahead of national elections, Colombian bishops call for strengthening democracy - Crux Now

The biggest challenge that we face is disinformation, about the 2020 election in particular, and more generally about the election system itself, Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon, a Democrat, said in an interview.

Their battle against mis- and disinformation comes at a tenuous time for American democracy, as an already diminished faith in the U.S. electoral system risks slipping further still in 2022. A recent NPR/Ipsos poll found that 64 percent of Americans believed democracy was in crisis and at risk of failing.

Not to be hyperbolic, but our democracy is at stake, New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver, a Democrat, said. This year, more than ever, trying to combat mis- and disinformation is crucial not just for trust in democracy but for those of us that are on the ballot this year. It is very real.

She is one of the roughly twenty secretaries of state up for reelection this year, many of whom have drawn challengers who have spread misinformation about election systems.

The struggles stemming from misinformation vary state-to-state, from dealing with threats of violence against election workers at all levels to contending with so-called insider threats election workers who themselves pose a security challenge to the system.

Not to be hyperbolic, but our democracy is at stake

New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver

And on top of that, many secretaries say local election officials in their states are facing pressures on other fronts, from physical and cybersecurity-related dangers to a potential retirement crisis looming in a field rife with burnout. Its a lively time in secretary of state offices, said Connecticut Secretary of State Denise Merrill, a Democrat. And it seems like every day some new issue crops up.

Merrill, who has been in office for over a decade, called misinformation the issue of our lifetime, and said that she anticipated combating misinformation to be a focus of her tenureship as co-chair of the National Association of Secretaries of State elections committee.

One of the most concerning things administrators have to prepare for is those insider threats spawned by misinformation, Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, a Democrat, said.

Griswold said her office has investigated potential instances in three counties where there may have been unauthorized access to election equipment, aided by election officials in the counties, with two continuing and one being cleared.

Its incredibly concerning that the people elected to oversee elections are working from within to undermine them, and that phenomenon in itself is increasing, she said. States need to get ready for situations where folks in the secretary of states office or the county clerks office, or the county clerks themselves, are working to undermine the elections from within.

Griswold and other election officials expressed concerns that proponents of former President Donald Trumps lies about the 2020 election are running for election administration positions. Trump himself has endorsed three secretary of state candidates and his followers have trained their attention on secretary of state and other election-related positions up this year.

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold speaks during a press conference about the Mesa County election breach investigation on Thursday, Aug. 12, 2021 in Denver.|RJ Sangosti/The Denver Post via AP

Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, who Griswold is seeking to bar from overseeing elections this year after Peters allegedly allowed an unauthorized person to access county voting machines, announced on Monday that she would be running to challenge Griswold in November.

Election officials also expressed concern at the increase of election mis- and disinformation coming from state lawmakers. Secretaries said that they were concerned that legislators and other elected officials are using their platforms to give a veneer of legitimacy to untrue claims about election systems, while also looking to introduce legislation that looks to act upon those conspiracies.

Its one thing if it is just some Twitter profile with an egg icon and 60 followers, said Kentucky Secretary of State Michael Adams, a Republican.

He said he generally doesnt think it is worth responding to pseudo-anonymous accounts spreading conspiracies, which would risk spreading and legitimizing it.

The biggest problem Ive got with regards to misinformation is weve got a sitting state senator whos going around the state conducting a tour alleging that were having corrupt, hacked elections, Adams said. Its not just fighting misinformation that shes putting out to the public, its also finding out the misinformation that shes putting within the legislature.

Election workers are still facing some of the most personal, direct consequences of the election conspiracy theories: threats of violence.

While most secretaries say that threats to their offices and the local officials in individual cities and counties dont carry the same fervor like the immediate aftermath of the 2020 election, several pointed to a far right activist in Colorado seemingly calling for Griswold to be hung last week as a sign that that rhetoric is still dangerously common, and could flair up again at a moments notice.

Many secretaries said they expected to focus on a model that emphasized promoting local partners like city and county election officials, civic groups and local media as the most effective way of combating it.

Its incredibly concerning that the people elected to oversee elections are working from within to undermine them, and that phenomenon in itself is increasing.

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold

Oregons Democratic Secretary of State Shemia Fagan said she wanted to refocus her office on the concept of pre-bunking misinformation instead of being reactive to it, by trying to put out information about election systems well ahead of the election.

She said her office was in the midst of planning for a series of PSAs about elections in Oregon. And she said that earned media instead of paid advertisements will be important, and that election officials need to build a stronger connection with local journalists to facilitate that.

How do we build that trusted relation with our media to say, if you hear something, reach out to us? Fagan said. Well try and go find you that accurate information to make sure that were not just spreading mis- and dis-information that comes in that maybe looks credible initially, because its more sophisticated.

Election officials also remain concerned about foreign disinformation efforts as well, which Fagan said federal officials have stressed is still active. They expect Russia to be much more involved in spreading mis- and disinformation in 2022 and 2024, she said.

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose speaks at the Ohio Republican Party event, in Columbus, Ohio.|Tony Dejak/AP Photo

Ohio Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose said he believed that local partnerships would be key to fighting off misinformation, foreign or domestic-based. He hoped to revive briefings with local media in his state to help explain the election processes and connect them with local election officials. He also said that he would continue to work with minority representation groups, like the NAACP and local Urban League chapters, because the communities they serve are often the targets of disinformation campaigns.

LaRose touted the benefits of outreach efforts, citing a robocall shortly before the 2020 election from Jacob Wohl, a far right conspiracy theorist. The call went out to Cleveland residents with false information about mail voting.

The moment that [call] went out, my phone started ringing personally from community leaders, ministers, local elected leaders reporting it to us, he said. And thankfully, one of them actually recorded it and passed it along to us.

Misinformation is far from the only problem election officials are dealing with, with other longrunning challenges demanding their attention. Several said they have seen an uptick in retirements after the 2020 election part of an already occurring brain drain that election officials fear could be exacerbated by threats and stress from running pandemic-era elections. And others expressed concerns about cybersecurity threats local offices were facing.

Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson, a Republican, said he has heard in the past couple weeks about phishing scams targeting local offices. He said his office has been trying to direct traffic on those scams and make sure local officials had the tools to recognize and report them. I think they have always been lurking, he said. The incidents [have] probably increased.

Election officials said they have increasingly been leaning on national partnerships both with other secretaries and federal agencies like the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security to help prepare local election workers.

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, said that she will soon host a workshop with CISA and local clerks in her state.

It has exploded out of control, Bellows said. Disinformation can lead to people threatening harm to election workers. She also said her office would work on further training for local officials, including de-escalation training, to help protect them in volatile situations.

One of the most recent disinformation campaigns has taken aim at an obscure but important part of Americas election infrastructure, an interstate compact known as the Electronic Registration Information Center. Officials on both sides of the aisle say it is an important part of election security in the United States.

The Electronic Registration Information Center often known as ERIC was originally founded a decade ago by seven states to help maintain voter rolls. Membership has since swelled to 31 states and Washington, D.C.

The organization shares some data between member states to find voters who may have moved, died or are otherwise potentially registered in another state. The organization also develops lists of potentially eligible voters who arent registered, and requires the state to contact them.

But ERIC has increasingly become a focus of some of the latest conspiracy theories, especially after a far right website popular among election deniers published a three part investigation into the organization labeling it a Soros funded group that is essentially a left wing voter registration drive.

(ERIC is funded exclusively by dues from member states, and its board of directors includes an election official from each member state, with membership ranging from the deep blue Maryland to red states like Alabama.)

It is the rare piece of Americas election system where there is broad, bipartisan consensus and has struck up an unusual bedfellows situation of secretaries willing to defend it. In interviews, all nine of the secretaries of state whose members belong to ERIC praised the effort. Secretary John Merrill of Alabama, a Republican, called it a valuable tool, while Merill of Connecticut called it an extremely constructive organization. (The two Merrills are unrelated.)

If Alabama was not a member of ERIC, then we would not be able to gain access to that data, because our state does not have the resources, the personnel or the financial wherewithal to create the kind of check and balance environment that exists with ERIC, John Merrill said. We would just be left out in the cold.

But one secretary has backed away from ERIC: Louisiana Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin, who is also the president of the National Association of Secretaries of State, or NASS.

Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin speaks to the House and Governmental Affairs Committee, Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2020, in Baton Rouge, La.|Melinda Deslatte/AP Photo

In a late-January announcement, Ardoin offices said that he would suspend the states participation in ERIC, saying in a statement that, after reading about these allegations and speaking with election attorneys and experts, I have determined that it may no longer be in Louisianas best interests to participate in this organization.

NASS does not have an institutional stance on ERIC, and Ardoins office declined an interview request. (An Ardoin staffer told NPR that his office has been in touch with ERIC.)

But his statement triggered grumbling from some other secretaries whose states are members.

It was a little bit out of the blue, and it was unexpected, Oregons Fagan said. I personally was surprised by it.

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Election officials are on the frontlines of defending democracy. They didn't sign up for this. - POLITICO

55 Voices for Democracy is inspired by the 55 BBC radio addresses Thomas Mann delivered from his home in California to thousands of listeners in Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, and the occupied Netherlands and Czechoslovakia between October 1940 and November 1945. In his monthly addresses Mann spoke out strongly against fascism, becoming the most significant German defender of democracy in exile. Building on that legacy, 55 Voices brings together internationally esteemed intellectuals, scientists, and artists to present ideas for the renewal of democracy in our own troubled times. The series is presented by the Thomas Mann House in partnership with theLos Angeles Review of Books,Sddeutsche Zeitung, andDeutschlandfunk.

Mohamed Amjahid calls for more emancipatory voices in transatlantic networks. He opposes derailed liberalism and emphasizes the need to show backbone and to stand in solidarity with vulnerable minorities. This effort, he says, is necessary for inclusive democracies to survive. Mohamed Amjahid is a political journalist, author of the bestsellers Among Whites and Whitewash, and a moderator. He was an editor at ZEITmagazin and has received, among other awards, the Alexander Rhomberg Prize and the Henri Nannen Prize. Amjahid is a 2022 Fellow at the Thomas Mann House in Los Angeles.

The video of Mohamed Amjahids talk can be viewed below.

Trigger Warning: Some old white men might feel offended by what I have to say. However, I am pretty sure everybody will survive this episode of 55 Voices, delivered from Thomas Manns desk in Pacific Palisades, where the rich, famous, and powerful reside.

When the violent mob better known as Trump supporters stormed the Capitol in Washington, DC, just over a year ago, a conspicuous group of liberals escorted them. Not necessarily on the streets, rather cheering from the sidelines for years and years.

How the fork did we get here? And what has it to do of all things with Germany?

Stakeholders from politics, media, society, and business, who act in the tradition of a long-established GermanUS friendship, gather under the keyword Atlanticists. They are the often-described old white men in positions of power who become sentimental at the famous sayings of USAmerican leaders from times long past: Ich bin ein Berliner! or Tear down this wall!

In this interdependent relationship between the Federal Republic and the United States, a dangerous understanding of liberalism was born. It threatens many vulnerable communities. Liberalism is in itself a positive term, dont get me wrong, because there is also something good about it: the self-determination and unhindered blossoming of each subject. But what is meant here is a liberalism that fetishizes freedom beyond all limits and elevates the individual sphere at the expense of the well-being of minorities and of society as a whole.

This exclusive understanding of individual freedom is central to simplistic liberalism. The underlying concept of freedom is defined in a fatal way: in a laissez-faire policy towards rightwing extremists and their friends, in exploitative capitalism and the preservation of old, discriminating structures. Unfortunately, many Atlanticists embody this derailed liberalism.

In the spirit of limitless freedom of speech, they say: Say what you want! And so Donald Trump said what he wanted: he reproduced hate speech against women, Black people, refugees, queer people. Millions of voters liked it so much, they made him president. Donald Trump was able to reach a huge audience through many mainstream and social media platforms, build a base, normalize his misanthropic views, alternative facts, and clownish behavior. Meanwhile, in Germany, the extremist AfD is being established as a legitimate political force in a deep-seated liberal belief. Even though they are no better than what Thomas Mann was fighting against from exactly this desk.

More than half a year after the storming of the Capitol in Washington, right-wing extremists tried to occupy the Reichstag in Berlin in August 2021. Armed with Nazi-symbols they got onto the stairs of the Federal German Parliament building. These events show that both US and German societies are threatened by the interaction between right-wing nationalist movements and hyper-liberal tolerance for them. Before the storms began on both sides of the Atlantic the radicalized views of the stormers were normalized by hyper-liberalism. That should be a warning for all our political decision makers. We cant let history repeat itself.

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55 Voices for Democracy: Mohamed Amjahid on the Antiquated Atlanticists - lareviewofbooks