Democracy and the Demagogue

There is a popular platitude, particularly among those who are critical of democracy, that
reminds us that Hitler was elected by a democracy. This is a great reminder of the fallibility of
the demos and the dangers of democracy, only there is one problem: that statement is almost
entirely apocryphal. While it is true that Hitler rose to power within a more or less democratic
state, the Weimar Republic, it is deceitful to imply that he rose to power democratically, even if
we consider a non-majority plurality of votes democratic. The truth behind the rise of Hitler was
that he in fact lost the presidential election to Paul von Hindenburg and was then appointed to
the position of Chancellor by Von Hindenburg in an effort to promote unity and efficacy within
the government. After being appointed Chancellor, everyones favorite democratically elected
dictator proceeded to gradually expand the powers of the Chancellor until von Hindenburg died,
at which point almost all political power was consolidated under the Chancellor and the Nazi
banner.
Surely, at first glance this would seem like a defense of democracy in the face of those
accusers who claim that some of the worst demagogues in history were installed by an ignorant
democratic populous. Such a defense would follow the logic that since Hitler was not given
power democratically then democracy is still desirable. The only problem with this logic is that it
ignores an equally fundamental defect of democracy that should worry us even more that the fact
that democracy has the penchant for electing demagogues: the fact that democracy is unable to
stop them once they take power. What is truly startling about the relation between Hitler and
democracy is not that he rose to power within it: the platonic critique that democracy enables
demagoguery is as valid as ever, but rather what is startling is that once such a demagogue
acquired power, a democratic populous had no power to stop him. Even with support from a
minority of the population, a demagogue or despot like Hitler has no trouble consolidating power
because once the power of the demagogue reaches a certain critical mass, it can, like the fusion
reactions inside of a star, continue to expand until it reaches the inevitable conclusion of
supernova, and once enough power is consolidated and that auto-catalytic mass is reached there
is nothing any coalition of people no matter how large can do to stop it.
The example of Hitler that is given an almost comical level of attention is not the only
reason to fear the impotence that democracy has to combat demagoguery. Dictators such as
Chavez, Sadam, France, and Pinochet can all claim to have successfully consolidated power to
the point where no amount of democratic protest could have overthrown them, at least not
without devastating consequences. It is important to note that even the despots that did end up
losing power such as Pinochet could have easily retained it had they had the intention. But
nevertheless the example of the fall of the Weimar Republic (perhaps along with Francoist Spain)
is most applicable to contemporary society for the reason that it often happens that we write off
dictators that come to power in non-western, non-first world countries. We say that because of
the poor infrastructure of the country, the poor standard of education, or the influence of foreign
governments, a non-popular demagogue can take control of the country, however these reasons
why a demagogue could never come to absolute power in the western world do not hold when
viewing the example of the Weimar Republic, which was by most margins one of the most
advanced countries in the world. It is true that Germany was impacted perhaps more than any
other country by the Great Depression, and the unparalleled economic crisis certainly contributed
to the rise of demagoguery, but it is also foolish to assume that modern propaganda cannot make
people feel as if we are in the midst of an economic crisis that rivals that of the Great Depression.
The empirical evidence that we are not as bad off as Germany was in the latter years of the
Weimar Republic means nothing in a world that acts primarily based on how people feel.
The point of this extended pontification is not to lament the death of truth and the rise of
post-truth. To lament the death of something seemingly implies that we once existed in a world
in which truth did matter, which cannot be said to be the case unless we ourselves those who
proclaim the new era of post-truth allow ourselves to be duped by feelings that there once
existed a utopia in which truth was treated with reverence. In fact the whole construction of post-
truth is just as equally dependent on an emotional appeal to an era that never empirically existed
as are claims that there was once a mythical era in western history that was somehow superior to
today. Moreover, the desire to attempt to reconstitute this era of truth is only doomed to end in
failure because it itself refuses to recognize the truth that truth has only ever been valuable
insofar as it is corroborated by emotion. Yet this is besides the point.
The true aim of this post is that one cannot hope that democracy will be able to right the
wrongs injured upon society by a demagogue. Not only are the peaceful protestations of a
democratic populous incapable of actually restricting the power of one who has no substantial
opposition from within the political world, but moreover even if those in opposition are in the
majority, it is unlikely that all of them will be able to resist propaganda campaigns capable of
placating or silencing them. This may seem overly pessimistic, saying that democracy is
incapable of defeating demagoguery, but that is only because we are programmed to search for
answers in what are perhaps the wrong places. We are conditioned to look for answers to crises
in the ineffable deity that is democracy, but that need not be our only recourse. The hidden
optimism of this post is that there are alternatives to democracy that perhaps have a greater
potential to be able to combat demagoguery. We could continue to appeal to our democratic
impulses, and in so doing we could continue to doom ourselves to demagogues and despots, or