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Democracy: Stories from the Long Road to Freedom

By Condoleezza Rice

TwelveBooks

496 page, $35

In an engaging Prologue to her new book, Democracy, Condoleezza Rice, George W. Bushs Secretary of State, and now a professor at Stanford University Graduate School of Business, recaps a long governmental career of nurturing democracy around the world.

In my view, her record for encouraging democracy if one could make such an assessment would be an A plus for having the right goals, and probably a C plus at best for its achievement.

Why such a grade? Because estimating individual efforts while representing ones government on the world stage has its limits. In a complicated mix of policy, ambition, cynicism, lack of transparency and outright criminality, grading individual effort among nations is a mugs game.

Nevertheless, her story itself is impressive. She begins her account in Moscow, 1979, as a young woman with friends in a communist country and afraid. Later she carries on with a description in July 1989 in Poland while working for President George H.W. Bush.

There, she indicates that Mikhail Gorbachev was rewriting the rule book for Eastern Europe, loosening the constraints of Moscows power. While in Warsaw, guests of a dying Communist party, she reports, watched the lights go out during the state dinner - a perfect metaphor for the regimes coming demise.

Rices uplifting message in this book is about what she hopes will be the survival of human rights. Her view isthat democracy can be revived where it is suffering. She draws from her experience in government, academe, and, as a private person, to show how it might be done.

I have watched, she writes, as people in Africa, Asia and Latin America have insisted on freedom. As a child, I was a part of another great awakening: the second founding of America, as the civil rights movement unfolded in my hometown of Birmingham, Ala., and finally expanded the meaning of We the people to encompass people like me. There is no more thrilling moment than when people finally seize their rights and their liberty.

Rice tells us that the climb toward freedom in the broader Middle East and North Africa have been a far rockier story. From Afghanistan and Iraq, to Syria, to Egypt, to Turkey, freedom is in flux amidst civil wars, military coups and instability. The region is a maelstrom. There, the decline of human rights is frightening despite America and its allies efforts.

In the long run, her view of democracys agenda is encouraging. But its a far distance from President Trumps "America First" ideas that seem to change daily.

Instead she writes that expanding the meaning of We the People to encompass people like me, has encouraged her to push for what she considers justice for all. Translated, it means that there is the inevitable movement of freedom (not necessarily via democracy) for others in countries across the world.

Our author knows from hard experience that getting tothat goal will be terrifying and disruptive and chaotic," she writes. "And what follows," she continues, "is hard really, really hard.

Why do it if its so difficult, the laconic reader may ask, sitting on a couch?

This isa query for all Americans to ask themselves. The answer is that it is a question of making an imperfect society better; never perfect, better. Does it look as if America is moving in that direction? Its every citizens responsibility to give a hand.

And this is Rices point in Stories from the Long Road to Freedom.

Rice is one keeper of democracys flame. There should be many more guardians. This book is a wake-up call.

America's torch needs the oxygen of its citizens. One hopes it doesnt expire.

Michael D. Langan a long time Buffalo News book reviewer. Heworked for Democrats and Republicans for twenty years in Washington, D. C.

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'Democracy' as Condoleezza Rice sees it - Buffalo News

Last week, as I travelled through West Africa, I was seized with trying to make sense of the countervailing winds competing to claim the future of the African continent.

Its quite the puzzle, attempting to reconcile the retrenchment of good governance in South Africa and throughout Central Africa, where leaders who have failed their people refuse to relinquish power, with the recent democratic coup in The Gambia, the historic defeat of an incumbent president in Ghana, and the consolidation of democracy throughout West Africa.

What were the forces at work? How could we influence them? Would Africas authoritarian leaders take comfort in President Trumps embrace of less-than-democratic leaders elsewhere in the world in Turkey, Egypt, the Philippines and in Russia? How could we tip the balance?

Born on Oct. 2, 1953, Gyimah is a man on a mission, advocating with cap-in-hand for support to strengthen Africas nascent democratic institutions. He is a regular in Washington, D.C. at the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and the International Republican Institute (IRI).

We met up on May Day, at HSI Orient Center for Health and Wellness on the outskirts of the city. Gyimah has large, deep-set, sauce-pan brown eyes, and a bald head that is always perspiring. He smiles with eyes-wide-open.

Our CEO @RivaLevinson on The opportunity of #Africa for a #Trump administration. @thehill https://t.co/wYy6g0Mn6x

I love this place! says Gyimah. But I dislike the chairs, they rest too low to the ground.

Thats not a complaint, but a practical observation for the 63-year-old Gyimah, whose lower limbs were weakened by polio as a toddler, and further strained by injury as he managed a childhood where handicapped children were granted no special accommodations. He navigates life with a cane and a crutch, and immense upper body strength. Gyimah possesses a complete absence of self-pity, he sees his handicap as a daily companion. The word burden is not in his vocabulary.

Growing up, Gyimah first wanted to become a preacher, then a lawyer. Inevitably, a curious child, coming of age just after Ghana received its independence from Britain in 1957, political science became his obsession, and then his calling. Since young adulthood, Gyimah has been involved in every major political milestone of the country, including its 2016 presidential and legislative elections which brought in the fifth president of Ghanas Fourth Republic.

I coordinate with the waitress to add another cushion to Gyimahs lawn chair before he takes a seat. I fix my chair the same way. Over way too-sweet iced green tea, along with spicy seafood salad, chicken and cashews, and mixed vegetables, we catch up.

I explain to Gyimah that I fear that my optimism about the future of democracy in Africa was coming across as nave, and share with him one of the many comments I received on my recent column, this one from a journalist based in Senegal from a prominent news daily in the UK.

She writes to me, Sadly I don't think I can agree with you. While The Gambia was positive in the end, at a similar time, terrible things were happening in Gabon and the DRC, South Africa is becoming more undemocratic by the day. I just don't think tiny, unimportant Gambia translates into anything wider.

Africa's example: How democracy begets democracy https://t.co/94mLbpYtAc

Gyimah shakes his head, knowingly. Then he offers, neither one of you is wrong, Riva.

You need to think of democracy as a commodity. How much is available? What is the quality of the product? What do people want? What are they willing to pay for it to do for it, clarifies Gyimah.

The journalist sees small ruling cliques still clinging to power. And to her, their grip feels like it is getting stronger. She is pessimistic. You are speaking of the free will of the African people, and their readiness to hold leaders accountable, and for you, their voices are getting louder. You are an optimist, he continues.

Gyimah explains to me that this debate goes to the very heart of Africa today, and that he sees the continent at a tipping point.

Will democracy be supply-constrained, or demand-driven? Will leaders be forced to make way for the next generation, or will frustration with the governing authorities diminish the belief of the African people in democratic institutions, opening the door for a return to authoritarianism?

Afrobarometer has measured this phenomena. Its latest polling released in November 2016 found that 7 in 10 Africans believe democracy is preferable to all forms of government. And at the same time, more than half of the respondents surveyed are dissatisfied with the quality of their democracy.

The Afrobarometer report concludes that there is a democratic deficit where demand for democracy exceeds supply, and because of this, the continent is likely to experience popular pressure for democratization, with the danger that unmet democratic demands may contribute to social unrest.

Gyimah notes that if you look at polling in the rest of the world, Africa is an outlier in its unwavering belief in democracy. Recent research in the Journal of Democracy shows that North America, Western Europe, Australia and New Zealand have all become more cynical about the value of democracy as a political system, and, overall, less hopeful that anything they do might influence actual public policy.

Trump and America can win by doing more business with Africa - The Hill (blog) https://t.co/5b1emMerpb

There are no assurances that Africa will continue to be an outlier. There is no guarantee that democracy will ultimately prevail, Gyimah concludes.

Thats why democracy assistance from multilateral, bilateral and individual donors is vital at this time. As domestic pro-democracy groups in Africa labor to reclaim lost ground on democratic governance and to protect and deepen democratization in their countries, they benefit greatly from solidarity on the part of the international community, he exclaims.

After vigorous notetaking, which included opening the links with my iPhone to Afrobarometers graphs and data sets, I return the conversation back to the comment that prompted Gyimahs political science lesson and ask if I am wrong to be optimistic?

Says Gyimah, No Riva, you are not. I too am a believer that the continents future will be demand-driven, and that a young generation, empowered through education, social media and new technologies, will claim their right to be heard.

Gyimah says that contributing to his sense of hope are the actions of the U.S. Congress last week, which prevented President Trump from making unprecedented cuts to the U.S. foreign assistance budget, indicating, he believes, that the consensus built in pursuit of democracy-building over decades in America is stronger than any one White House occupant.

And then Gyimah adds, I have always held that the right leader can lift a nation, and the emergence of an anchor democracy, can lift the entire continent. And here I am hopeful, because I believe we are going to see this phenomena in Ghana in the coming years.

And with that comment, some two hours later, Gyimah asks for the check and we pack up 75 percent of the food we ordered, as neither of us found the time to eat. But we did manage to finish our too-sweet iced green tea, only after it was thrice diluted.

K. Riva Levinson is President and CEO of KRL International LLC a D.C.-based consultancy that works in the worlds emerging markets, and author of "Choosing the Hero: My Improbable Journey and the Rise of Africa's First Woman President" (Kiwai Media, June 2016), Silver Medal winner Independent Book Publishers Award, Finalist, Foreword ReviewsINDIES Book of the Year Awards. Follow her on Twitter @RivaLevinson.

The views expressed by contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.

Originally posted here:
Democracy's supply and demand in Africa at a tipping point - The Hill (blog)

Not even the president is above the law.

This seems like such an ironclad principle, one upon which both Democrats and Republicans would readily agree, regardless of which party holds the Oval Office. But that principle is being tested in a way that we have rarely experienced in our nations history. President Trumps firing of FBI Director James Comey and the patently transparent ruse that the action was in response to the Hillary Clinton email investigation shocked many across the political spectrum. Not since the days of Watergate have we experienced such corruption at the highest levels of government, and I am profoundly concerned for the future of our democracy.

This is far from the first instance of President Trump considering himself exempt from the law. Since his inauguration, the president and his Republican enablers have ignored the fact that he stands in violation of the Constitutions Emoluments Clause, intended by the framers to prevent foreign influence of our elected officials. This is, of course, the very charge that has ensnared the presidents former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and threatens still others within his inner circle. Lets also not forget the presidents firing of acting Attorney General Sally Yates after she refused to implement his illegal Muslim ban, even though Yates decision was entirely within her authority and subsequently reaffirmed by federal courts.

The presidents pattern is clear: When provoked, he lashes out.

During a congressional hearing March 20, Comey directly contradicted the presidents wild and irresponsible tweets about wiretapping. So the president responded by manipulating Chairman Devin Nunes into spreading baseless propaganda that supposedly supported the presidents claims. This time, the FBI issued subpoenas to associates of Flynn and requested a significant increase in resources for the Russia investigation. So the president responded by unceremoniously firing the head of the investigation that was following a trail of evidence to the Oval Office.

Make no mistake: Many Democrats, including myself, disagreed with Comeys handling of the investigation into Clintons private email server. But its utterly ridiculous to think that the president and the attorney general would suddenly, in May 2017, lose confidence in Comey for his actions taken in July 2016.

As a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I have had several opportunities to hear from and question Comey on the progress of his Russia investigation. Though a smoking gun has yet to be discovered, the director left me with no doubt that he was leading the investigation with the utmost seriousness, and would direct the FBI to go wherever the evidence led them.

This, of course, is what most terrified the president.

I am deeply skeptical that the president will nominate an impartial and independent FBI director who would charge ahead from where Comeys Russia investigation left off. The attorney general and his deputy are also tainted with this farce of a dismissal. The appointment of an independent special counsel is the only clear way to ensure a comprehensive investigation that the American people expect and deserve.

Those in public service, including elected officials, swear an oath upon assuming the responsibilities of office to defend and uphold the Constitution of the United States. Our allegiance is not to any individual, but to the founding principles of our nation and the laws that safeguard them. The Constitution is under siege, and all who love it Democrats and Republicans alike must join forces to defend it.

Jackie Speier represents the 14th District in the U.S. House of Representatives. She serves on the House Permanent Selection Committee on Intelligence and is ranking member of the House Armed Services Military Personnel Subcommittee.

Excerpt from:
Moment of peril for democracy - San Francisco Chronicle

American democracy is in crisis. Part of that crisis has to do with technology. But theres another, often overlooked, factor at play.

Im a professor, so I think that fixing America starts with education. We can help improve our democratic processes by using technology to improve schools. I dont mean that we should put iPads into every school, or give every child a laptop. I mean something more fundamental: We should use technology to make sure every public school in America has all of the books, supplies, and learning materials that they need.

A shocking number of public schools dont have these basic tools. Without the basics, we cant properly educate the next generation of informed citizens.

Technology is the only way to keep track of how many students are in each school, and what books and supplies each teacher needs. A few years ago, I did an investigative project in which I looked at whether Philadelphia schools had enough books for their students. They didnt. The same people write the books and write the standardized tests; my not-so-radical suggestion was that the students needed the books to prepare for the tests. The average Philly school had only 27 percent of the books they would need to teach the students in the building. Since then, Philadelphia has allocated $36 million for new textbooks and curriculum materials, provided a new computer to each pre-K-12 teacher, and allocated $7.8 million as a one-time investment for additional supplies and educational materials for every school. Its a step in the right direction.

I know that books arent the whole story (I teach computational journalism). Students also need spacious, well-lit classrooms with working internet connections. They need safe schools with bathrooms that work and are cleaned regularly. They need unleaded water in school buildings with roofs that dont leak and grow mold. In too many cases, these basic needs are not met in Philadelphias public schools, nor in other major American cities.

A few more items at the top of my lets-improve-democracy wish list: We should pay public school teachers more, and hire more of them so class sizes are smaller. Teachers arent paid enough, and yet they are so dedicated that they spend their own money on supplies. (Thank you, teachers.)

We need to fix the copiers and printers in every school and keep them stocked with plenty of paper. If you are a school district that doesnt buy books and workbooks, and instead you make teachers teach using random stuff they find on the Internet, then you dont even provide a copier and printer that workwell, youve just created major obstacles to your students becoming educated citizens. If the copier doesnt work, the teacher is stranded. Broken technology hurts democracy.

I truly wish there were a single technological solution that would fix every problem in every classroom. Then, I could wave a magic wand and declare, Make it so! But public school is a complex system that doesnt really work without humans in the loop.

Weve certainly tried replacing teachers with computer-based training. It has not gone well. Have you attempted to do any of the online learning modules that kids get assigned? I have. Most are deathly boring. Or there are the modules that claim to be fun, where the creators package up a mundane, repetitive arithmetic task as some kind of animal flying around the screen or navigating some kind of ridiculous maze. Kids recognize this. This is the kind of fun that your mom means when she says its going to be fun to learn how to do laundry, or to clean the smelly, rotten leaves out of the gutters.

We need technology to run our schools. Not glamorous cutting-edge technology, but workhorse technology: databases, and staff to enter the data into the databases, and database administrators to keep everything running and do the load-balancing at the beginning and end of the semester when hundreds of schools are trying to enter in their updated inventory data simultaneously. We need more accurate budgeting that factors in everything a school needs, from pencils to laptops to tater tots. We could use artificial intelligence if that makes it seem more exciting. To investigate the book situation (and offer a solution) in Philadelphia, I built A.I. software. Its open source, and its available online, for free. School districts have not yet come knocking on my door, begging me to implement it so they can update their budgeting and inventory management processesbut hope springs eternal.

Thomas Jefferson once wrote: Educate and inform the whole mass of the people they are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty. I believe this. And I believe that technology can help us make a better world. However, I dont believe that we need radically new, different technology to fix Americas public schools. We can start by fixing and funding what we already have.

This article is part of a collaboration with the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University.

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Broken Technology Hurts Democracy - The Atlantic

A Hungarian Member of the European Parliament (MEP) leveled harsh criticism at the EU and its globalist allies for accusing Hungary, and by extension other, more conservative Central European nations, of undermining democracy.

In an interview with German newspaper Deutsche Welle, published this week, outspoken Hungarian MEP Gyorgy Schpflin said that comparisons between Hungary and autocratic countries such asRussia and Turkey are false and politically motivated.

They perform this virtue signaling in order to deflect attention from equivalent problems at homethis is an old rhetorical trick.

Undermining democracy is very much a question of what one means by democracy is it rule by the consent of the governed or domination by the values of the liberal elite, regardless of consent? Schpflin said.

Accusing Central European countries like Hungary, which resists mass migrationand open borders, of being anti-democratic and illiberal is a favorite tactic of progressive globalists.

Less than two weeks ago, now-French President Emmanuel Macron accused both Hungary andPoland both NATO members and EU member-states of being anti-Democratic regimes in a roundaboutattack on his then-opponent, Marine Le Pen.

We all know who Le Pens allies are: the regimes of [Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor] Orban, [Polish Law and Justice Party chairman Jaroslaw] Kaczynski, [Russian President Vladimir] Putin, Macron said. These arent regimes with an open and free democracy. Every day they break many democratic freedoms.

An April headline from The New York Times Editorial Board decried Hungarys Assault on Freedom. A recent sub-headline in The Economist declared that In Europes illiberal east, populist nationalism is alive and well, while a 2016 article in the same magazinewas titled, Illiberal Central Europe: Big, Bad Visegrad.

In 2016, the EU parliament on two occasions officially accused the Polish government of being anti-democratic. In September 2016 it issued a resolution saying that the Polish governments endanger[s] democracy, fundamental rights and the rule of law in Poland. A New York Times headline from April of this year described Polands Anti-Democratic Drift.

Contrary to the widespread liberal narrative of democratic backsliding in Central Europe, the institutional order in Hungary works well, said Schpflin. The Constitutional Court regularly quashes draft laws passed by parliament, and the EUs Justice Scoreboard places Hungary in the top third of EU member states, he continued.

As far as the media are concerned, even a casual sampling of what is published will show that there is very wide-ranging, often very harsh, criticism of the government, of Fidesz and of Orban personally, Schpflin said. No journalist has been arrested, so parallels with Turkey or Russia are nonsense.

Schpflin also challenged the attacks on Hungarys new education law targeting Soros Central European University, which critics charge is an assault on democratic freedoms. Academic freedom is intact, said Schpflin. Again, a sampling of what is published will demonstrate this. Much of academia lean to the liberal left and remain in their posts.

"As far as the CEU is concerned, it enjoys a privileged position inasmuch as it grants both Hungarian and American diplomas, but without its having an American mother university, hence American academic oversight," Schpflin said.

"The higher education law is about regulating this. Whether the CEU will want to regularize this is their decision. There is no commitment on the part of the Hungarian government to expel the CEU." If Hungary can be in any way accused of "illiberalism," it is only in the economic sphere, said Schpflin.

Schpflin suggested globalist voices use the vilification of Hungary as somehow anti-democratic to divert attention from pressing problems in their own nations.

"They perform this virtue signaling in order to deflect attention from equivalent problems at home, along the lines of 'yes, there may be difficulties here, but look how much worse things are in illiberal, authoritarian, autocratic Hungary,'" he said, "this is an old rhetorical trick."

Read the original here:
Hungarian MP blasts progressive vilification of countries' pursuing their national interest - LifeZette