The End of Liberal Democracy | Vidar Önnerfors | TEDxYouth@UWCUSA
about two months ago I was in our library here on campus looking through the magazines and I came across this one magazine I didn't read before this one the Atlantic and what drew me and it was the title it's democracy dying this is a question that a lot of people across the world are beginning to ask themselves it's a question that's coming up as a result of the threats many perceived that is coming from the authoritarian forces in our society that's what I want to talk to you about today but before we start discussing we need to define certain terms the first of which is liberal democracy liberal democracy it's a political system which focuses on individual rights and personal freedom and protects these and recognizes them by law the second definition is authoritarianism which is also political system but focuses on obedience to Authority and a lack of personal feel essentially can see these two as polar opposites liberal democracy is the system most of us here are used to and it's one use across most of the Western world so to understand what's happening today in our political situation we need to first look back about a hundred years to the period between the two world wars at this time Europe was a shambles there are food shortages and the Great Depression adjusted people were desperate for change willing to do almost anything to make their life better even if that meant sacrificing their freedom this was the ideal breeding ground for radical and out of this authoritarian groups group they promise easy solutions to the problems people are facing but as always with authoritarians easy solutions came at a cost the cost personal freedom and democracy the growth of authoritarian political systems led to a rivalry a rivalry between political systems which culminated in the second world war the authoritarian states lost and the fascist ideas were dismissed instead a new rivalry came out the rivalry between liberal democracy on one hand and the communist system on the other when the USSR the representative of the communist system fell in 1991 people across the Western world proclaimed the end of history liberal democracy had proved itself to be the superior system the most sustainable and successful one nothing else to drive away by internalizing this view of an end of history we embraced the narrative that political scientists would call a politics of inevitability meaning that we saw a certain political development is bound to happen in this case would be the growth and development of liberal democracies worldwide as inevitable after all liberal democracy had proved itself to be the most sustainable system right that may be true but that quickly fades from people's minds this view of something of a development as inevitable leads to an unsettling comfort we started taking our systems for granted we stopped questioning them but we stopped dismissed we dismissed the alternatives as the author Timothy Snyder would put it well we start taking our freedom for granted we do not recognize the threat of those who want to take it away from us for what it is when we starts try to solve our problems with easy solutions what we do not recognize the intentions behind the changes that certain groups are kind of push through whether that be quietening your political opponents or restricting immigration we are falling right into the arms of authoritarian de cost will likely be the same personal freedom and democracy if you think this is not happening already you're wrong it is in countries like Poland and Hungary far-right authoritarians have been in government for several years now and are making changes to do - OSes the judicial judicial system the amount of presidential terms and even to the Constitution all these are signs of a democracy that is weathering the most probable thing that will come out of this the most probable thing that will happen in the future is what has already happened in the past the last time in Scotland our democracy spell and World War 2 came out of it but since then we have seen less fighting we've seen the growth of democracy worldwide through for example the UN through increased cooperation instead of separation we've seen less fighting than ever before for me as a European the greatest example of this cooperation is a European Union the European Union was created after the world the Second World War to create peace as a space and stability for Europe this would be achieved through European integration a process of cultural political and economic exchanges between European countries judging by the fact that we haven't had a war within the European Union for the last 70 years many say that it's pretty successful but personally this is not the only reason why I believe in it the reason why I believe in the European Union is because I've seen them working first penned but my parents come from Sweden but moved to Luxembourg to work for the institution growing up in Luxembourg I went to European school the school with people from all across the continents it wasn't perfect Anna's problems and there are a lot of differences and divisions between people of different nationalities but what I can tell you is that people from my school no others from all over Europe that people in my school can recognize almost any European language as soon as it's spoken and that people whose grandparents were killing each other only 75 years ago are now friends the European Union itself is applause its bureaucratic and frankly there's a lot of ways but what it has achieved is peace through European integration European Union is not the only institution to have done this UN and other regional unions like the African Union I've also done this but what the problems were facing nowadays the belief in these types of institutions is falling when you feel at threat from an invasion or a massive amount of foreigners coming into your country then European corporation is no longer important then this that it's easier to turn to the people with the easy solutions then it's easier to turn your back on liberal democracy and choose authoritarianism to turn your back on cooperation and choose separation instead this is the development we're seeing today so is this the end of liberal democracy well it can be if we do not study our history we are bound to repeat the mistakes our ancestors made in a very similar situation what if we do if we learn from the mistakes they made we can prevent this one thing that is important to learn is that when authoritarianism power one of the worst things we can do is to be passive if we do not belong to our personal freedom to be restricted we need to take action we need to question the changes that are being made we need to discuss and the debates with these people we need to defend the institutions that we want to uphold because frankly if we don't we can no longer ask questions like this thank you [Applause]