tag:theconversation.com,2011:/au/topics/vaclav-havel-2066/articlesVaclav Havel – The Conversation2017-05-03T14:11:50Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/753562017-05-03T14:11:50Z2017-05-03T14:11:50ZWhat eastern bloc dissidents can teach us about ‘living in truth’<p>“Fake news” may be getting lots of <a href="https://theconversation.com/fake-news-why-people-believe-it-and-what-can-be-done-to-counter-it-70013">headlines</a>, but it is as old as the hills. Propagandists have relied on false evidence for centuries. Of course, not all propaganda campaigns are dishonest; indeed many efforts at persuading people of things are laudable. But the phenomenon of fake news and the “post-truth” culture in which it thrives are clearly a threat to democracy, and to the public sphere that democracy depends on to survive.</p>
<p>Everyone has a part to play in pushing back. Most of us probably assume that only other people fall prey to false or exaggerated news stories. This is complacent. Media historians emphasise that propaganda often exploits <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=pEsXBAAAQBAJ&pg=PT54&lpg=PT54&dq=propaganda+builds+on+things+that+already+exist&source=bl&ots=yirPSQwlSd&sig=KB_72F0eQGl43nHJ5guMQf7lpEU&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjM26C5wNHTAhWDzxQKHWSEAV0Q6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q=propaganda%20builds%20on%20things%20that%20already%20exist&f=false">already-existing trends</a> rather than creating new ones, making subtle use of half-truths as well as outright falsehoods – and it can be much harder to unpick half-truths than to demolish lies. </p>
<p>Fortunately, a few decades ago, matters of truth-telling and lying were a major concern for Soviet and Eastern European dissidents living under communism, where propaganda was all-pervasive. Their ideas have long outlasted their times, and today they should interest anyone seeking to challenge dishonesty or speak truth to power, or even simply to live truthfully. </p>
<p>They are all the more relevant because the propaganda techniques currently used by Moscow have roots in the Soviet era, and it is valuable to know how people sought to respond to them then. But their ideas have a relevance well beyond Russia; after all, no country, group or person is immune to half-truths or disinformation.</p>
<h2>Reality itself</h2>
<p>On these issues, the thinking of Russian novelist Alexander Solzhenitsyn, one of Soviet communism’s most trenchant critics, deserves special attention. When Solzhenitsyn was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970, he built his <a href="http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1970/solzhenitsyn-lecture.html">Nobel lecture</a> around a Russian proverb: “One word of truth outweighs the whole world”. Simple truths, he argued, are always a threat to totalitarianism.</p>
<p>In his 1974 essay, <a href="http://www.orthodoxytoday.org/articles/SolhenitsynLies.php">Live Not by Lies</a>, Solzhenitsyn suggested that to end repression, people needed to resist lies and learn to live “by truth”. “Never knowingly support lies,” he declared. While he acknowledged that that could be risky, to put it mildly, he saw it as a kind of minimalist strategy, one within everyone’s reach.</p>
<p>Dissidents and reformers alike read Live Not by Lies as a vision for a different kind of society. One man impressed with Solzhenitsyn’s thinking was the Czech dramatist and future president, Václav Havel. In his 1978 essay, <a href="https://chnm.gmu.edu/1989/items/show/700">The Power of the Powerless</a>, Havel suggested that people “need not accept the lie”. He imagines a greengrocer who stops putting up slogans he disagrees with and voting in fake elections, and starts to say what he really thinks at political meetings – breaking the “rules of the game” that underpin the system. In finding the strength to follow his conscience, Havel suggests, the man makes an attempt to live “within the truth”.</p>
<p>The notion of “living in truth” points to the idea that being truthful isn’t just a matter of uttering true statements, but also about becoming a truthful person in the fullest sense. Truthfulness and integrity are entwined; <a href="http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/audiences/2013/documents/papa-francesco_20130515_udienza-generale.html">religious thinkers</a> sometimes talk of the “spirit of truth” at work within people. The Russian philosopher Semyon Frank, writing from a Christian humanist perspective, once wrote that truth is ‘not a judgement about reality, but the living presence of the reality itself".</p>
<p>Another relevant text is <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1988/06/02/books/books-of-the-times-an-individual-s-triumph-over-soviet-state-power.html">Fear No Evil</a>, a 1986 memoir by Jewish refusnik Nathan Sharansky. Sharansky was imprisoned for his involvement in the <a href="http://www.osce.org/secretariat/73223?download=true">Moscow Helsinki Group</a>, set up in 1976 to monitor human rights abuses. He used to prepare for interrogation by reflecting on the Psalms of David and having imaginary conversations with characters from literature. He was conscious that if he did not develop a rich inner life, he could easily be drawn into compromises he would later regret. </p>
<p>Again, this speaks to our own time, where it is so easy for people to get caught up in the latest news story or media-driven discussion. When we lose our “inner freedom” – another term popular in dissident circles – we become open to manipulation by political, commercial and cultural agendas of all kinds.</p>
<h2>Truth for its own sake</h2>
<p>Truth-telling is not easy in times when the very concept of truth has been brought into disrepute. Lenin named the Bolshevik newspaper Pravda, which is Russian for truth. In practice, this meant the politicisation of truth – identifying as true whatever policy or idea the Communist Party chose to promote. Unsurprisingly, there was widespread disillusionment when the Soviet regime failed to deliver on its promises.</p>
<p>It is hard not to be cynical about people who loudly claim to speak the truth, and understandings of what truth even is have certainly changed over time. But to move from that insight to saying that everyone has their own truth is a step too far. No university would survive on a principle like that, even if the “post-truth” culture, with its implicit connections to postmodernism, has some of its roots <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-surprising-origins-of-post-truth-and-how-it-was-spawned-by-the-liberal-left-68929">in the academy</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/167559/original/file-20170502-17263-gno5tl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/167559/original/file-20170502-17263-gno5tl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=145&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/167559/original/file-20170502-17263-gno5tl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=145&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/167559/original/file-20170502-17263-gno5tl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=145&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/167559/original/file-20170502-17263-gno5tl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=182&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/167559/original/file-20170502-17263-gno5tl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=182&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/167559/original/file-20170502-17263-gno5tl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=182&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Truth: Pravda’s masthead.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pravda_logo.png#/media/File:Pravda_logo.png">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Truth is more than a means to an end. There are times when truths need to be expressed, whether or not a positive outcome will be the result. As Anatoly Yakobson, editor of Soviet human rights journal The Chronicle of Current Events, once <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=pIPMFvJW5AgC&pg=PA136&lpg=PA136&dq=%22One+must+begin+by+postulating+that+truth+is+needed+for+its+own+sake+and+for+no+other+reason%22&source=bl&ots=2lq8jUTkqO&sig=TWMLyIFCme4PfI8QTsORNz4Ayro&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiI5LDHtdHTAhXKvBQKHVNZCIMQ6AEIKjAB#v=onepage&q=%22One%20must%20begin%20by%20postulating%20that%20truth%20is%20needed%20for%20its%20own%20sake%20and%20for%20no%20other%20reason%22&f=false">declared</a>: “One must begin by postulating that truth is needed for its own sake and for no other reason.” Or in the words of famous physicist and dissident <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=17seBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA91&lpg=PA91&dq=%22may+hope+for+nothing,+but+nevertheless+speak+because+he+cannot,+simply+cannot+remain+silent%22&source=bl&ots=z7EoXEAERE&sig=tDW0GBSglvAGtQCGI0T6oFwhHnQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiNouCHttHTAhUE6xQKHXtuDrEQ6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q=%22may%20hope%20for%20nothing%2C%20but%20nevertheless%20speak%20because%20he%20cannot%2C%20simply%20cannot%20remain%20silent%22&f=false">Andrei Sakharov</a>: “[A man] may hope for nothing, but nevertheless speak because he cannot, simply cannot remain silent.”</p>
<p>Living in truth doesn’t mean speaking out unthinkingly on every issue. It matters not just what we say, but how we say it. It’s all too easy to become strident or pedantic, forgetting that truths expressed well have the power to unlock hearts and open up conversation. Besides, truth and untruth are often mixed up, and it can take time and care to separate the two.</p>
<p>In these times as much as ever, we must live in truth, and learn to tell the truth in constructive ways. This may seem obvious, but in practice it’s no small task – and democracy depends on it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/75356/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Philip Boobbyer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As Solzhenitsyn saw it, simple truths are always a threat to totalitarianism.Philip Boobbyer, Reader in History, University of KentLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/611482016-08-12T01:52:46Z2016-08-12T01:52:46ZWestern democracy needs humility to step beyond its own shadow<p><em>This article is part of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/democracy-futures">Democracy Futures</a> series, a <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/democracy-futures/">joint global initiative</a> with the <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/">Sydney Democracy Network</a>. The project aims to stimulate fresh thinking about the many challenges facing democracies in the 21st century. This is part two of an essay on humility’s value for democracy in dark times. Read part one <a href="https://theconversation.com/humilitys-value-for-democracy-in-dark-times-58500">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>Joshua Kurlantzick’s provocative book <a href="http://www.cfr.org/democratization/democracy-retreat/p29458">Democracy in Retreat</a> paints a pessimistic picture of the prospects for democracy in much of the world. Echoing <a href="http://www.journalofdemocracy.org/article/end-transition-paradigm">Thomas Carothers’ influential observations</a>, Kurlantzick strongly suggests political transitions can no longer be expected to lead to liberal democracy.</p>
<p>Reflecting on how democracy promoters should adjust to this changing environment, he concludes:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Even while reviving aggressive advocacy for democracy and human rights, established democracies also need to become more humble. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>This seems like an intuitively reasonable suggestion. But what might it actually mean?</p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/humilitys-value-for-democracy-in-dark-times-58500">Humility is a valuable trait</a> to possess when viewing attempts at democratisation, which is inevitably a difficult and fraught process. The frustration and impatience with the uneven and incomplete nature of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Wave_Democracy">third wave</a> of democratisation, as well as the disappointment with the inconclusive direction of the Arab Spring, is based on a superficial reading of how democracy successfully developed elsewhere.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/127690/original/image-20160622-19773-1ngh5zc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/127690/original/image-20160622-19773-1ngh5zc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127690/original/image-20160622-19773-1ngh5zc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127690/original/image-20160622-19773-1ngh5zc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127690/original/image-20160622-19773-1ngh5zc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127690/original/image-20160622-19773-1ngh5zc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127690/original/image-20160622-19773-1ngh5zc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">What should we make of the short-lived optimism of the Arab Spring?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kurbey Urner/flickr</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>As Samuel Huntington <a href="http://www.ou.edu/uschina/gries/articles/IntPol/Huntington.91.Demo.3rd.pdf">observed</a>, each wave of democratisation has been followed by a reverse wave in which some countries revert to non-democratic rule. Failed attempts at democratisation and the return of authoritarian regimes are hardly new phenomena, and they certainly should <a href="https://theconversation.com/does-islam-have-a-problem-with-democracy-the-case-of-the-maldives-58040">not be unexpected</a>.</p>
<p>It is remarkable how quickly optimism about the Arab Spring gave way to disappointment. The situation may not look positive right now, but the story is far from finished.</p>
<h2>An uneven and ongoing process</h2>
<p>Despite the allusion to Europe’s <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_of_1848">“springtime of the peoples”</a>, many seem to forget that the immediate consequences of the 1848 revolutions were thoroughly disappointing from the perspective of democracy. It took many of these countries another century of considerable bloodshed and instability to usher in stable democratic rule.</p>
<p>Democratisation is an uneven and ongoing process, one that can provide hope but no guarantees. Not until the 1960s did all citizens in the US receive full and equal rights, and problems still remain, notably in attempts to disenfranchise people through <a href="http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2014/01/voter-id-laws">aggressive forms of voter identification</a>. </p>
<p>It is vital to appreciate the difficult, uneven nature of democratisation and the considerable challenges of maintaining democracy. This was observed by Václav Havel, who <a href="http://www.leaderu.com/ftissues/ft9503/articles/havel.html">reflected</a> on “the limited ability of today’s democratic world to step beyond its own shadow”.</p>
<p>Too often, democracy is understood solely in reference to the Western experience with it. One recent example of this is the <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/03/16/the-u-s-must-put-democracy-at-the-center-of-its-foreign-policy/">open letter</a> calling on US presidential candidates to prioritise democracy promotion. It states:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>There is no cookie-cutter approach to supporting democracy and human rights, but there are fundamental, universal features we should emphasise: representative institutions, rule of law, accountability, free elections, anti-corruption, free media (including the internet), vibrant civil society, independent trade unions, property rights, open markets, women’s and minority rights, and freedoms of expression, assembly, association and religion.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>What is presented here as “universal” is actually a prescription of democracy that accords closely with the American experience. Many of these features are highly valuable and worthwhile, but this is an argument that should be made, rather than simply appealing to universalism, which many are rightly sceptical of.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130665/original/image-20160715-2150-ewonpu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130665/original/image-20160715-2150-ewonpu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130665/original/image-20160715-2150-ewonpu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130665/original/image-20160715-2150-ewonpu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130665/original/image-20160715-2150-ewonpu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130665/original/image-20160715-2150-ewonpu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=562&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130665/original/image-20160715-2150-ewonpu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=562&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130665/original/image-20160715-2150-ewonpu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=562&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">John Gast’s 1872 painting American Progress shows Columbia, a personification of the US, leading civilisation and democracy westward.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A more humble approach</h2>
<p>A more humble approach would start from the assumption that political change does not necessarily mean democratisation, but, when it does occur, a desire for democracy does not automatically mean a preference for the specific liberal democratic model found in the West. </p>
<p>On this point, <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Larbi_Sadiki">Larbi Sadiki</a> has argued that Western preconceptions limit our ability to understand what democratisation and democracy may look like in the Arab Middle East.</p>
<p>In particular, there is a strong need to be more attuned to the way the political and economic spheres relate in the democracy. In the dominant model of liberal democracy – one that matches the above description – the economic sphere is normally removed from democratic control. </p>
<p>In fact, it often works to constrain democratic possibilities. The strong pressure for economic liberalisation and structural reforms has had very mixed results. And where it has caused considerable hardship for people, it has tarnished democracy’s name.</p>
<p>As <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2013/06/18/a-users-guide-to-democratic-transitions/">Coleman and Lawson-Remer observed</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The success of emerging democracies depends fundamentally on whether democratisation can also materially improve people’s lives.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>With growing socioeconomic problems in many transitional countries and consolidated democracies, the promise of democracy looks increasingly hollow or false. Democracy is meant to be about freedom and equality, but more people now wonder if it can deliver either.</p>
<p>Economics is also relevant for considering the changing ideational climate surrounding democracy. Perceptions that China has been performing strongly, combined with the economic troubles of developed democracies since the 2008 financial crisis, means there is not the same degree of confidence in democratisation being the best course for political transitions.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130670/original/image-20160715-2120-z6efqm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130670/original/image-20160715-2120-z6efqm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130670/original/image-20160715-2120-z6efqm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130670/original/image-20160715-2120-z6efqm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130670/original/image-20160715-2120-z6efqm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130670/original/image-20160715-2120-z6efqm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=618&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130670/original/image-20160715-2120-z6efqm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=618&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130670/original/image-20160715-2120-z6efqm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=618&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Not a universally loved brand: this mural on the wall of Tehran’s former US embassy declares: ‘We stomp on America’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/adavey/4771974342">A. Davey/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Growing doubts have been reinforced by the many problems and challenges Western democracies are facing. Brexit did little to recommend the virtues of democracy to the rest of the world. If anything, it revived classical fears that putting power in the hands of the people is a recipe for bad decisions. </p>
<p>The unravelling of America’s political system is especially <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/04/25/why-is-america-so-bad-at-promoting-democracy-in-other-countries/">damaging for the brand of democracy</a>. Others are more likely to emulate America’s democratic ideals if it is widely regarded as a just, prosperous, vibrant and tolerant society. </p>
<p>Instead, it is one where inequality is rampant, gun violence is depressingly common, leading politicians are loudmouthed xenophobes, the prison population is the world’s largest, and airports and other public infrastructure are visibly decaying. This is hardly a great advertisement for democracy.</p>
<h2>A two-way approach to supporting democracy</h2>
<p>Simply put, democracy’s brand is not as attractive as it once was. In turn, this suggests supporters of democracy would benefit from turning inward and considering the limitations of their own regimes. </p>
<p>Adopting a more humble approach suggests a more open, two-way approach to supporting democracy, in which both sides learn from each other. Given that established democracies face serious problems with de-democratisation and the undermining of democratic institutions and practices, there is value in seeing what lessons or experiences they can potentially draw upon.</p>
<p>One danger of adopting a more humble approach is that it can justify or encourage inaction. This has been an accusation repeatedly levelled at US President Barack Obama for his responses to political turmoil in the Ukraine and the Middle East. </p>
<p>There are legitimate grounds for concern here. Certainly, passivity does not cohere well with a democratic ethos. But, if instead one understands humility in terms of an awareness of one’s limits and an acknowledgement of what has yet to be achieved, it has the potential to support democratic government. </p>
<p>Retreat from the world is not a viable option, but one must come to terms with the constraints on action that do limit what possible futures are open. Arthur Schlesinger junior conveyed this idea well when <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1992/06/22/opinion/reinhold-niebuhr-s-long-shadow.html">describing the worldview</a> of one of America’s most important thinkers on humility, Reinhold Niebuhr:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Humility, he believed, must temper, not sever, the nerve of action.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130669/original/image-20160715-2110-1ns7vyv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130669/original/image-20160715-2110-1ns7vyv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130669/original/image-20160715-2110-1ns7vyv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=686&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130669/original/image-20160715-2110-1ns7vyv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=686&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130669/original/image-20160715-2110-1ns7vyv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=686&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130669/original/image-20160715-2110-1ns7vyv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=862&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130669/original/image-20160715-2110-1ns7vyv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=862&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130669/original/image-20160715-2110-1ns7vyv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=862&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Western democracy is no longer the only game in town: China’s Wang Qishan accepts an autographed basketball from Barack Obama.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wang_Qishan_,Obama_Basketball_S%26ED.jpg">Pete Souza/White House</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Much as Francis Fukuyama’s claims that we had reached “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/mar/21/bring-back-ideology-fukuyama-end-history-25-years-on">the end of history</a>” were overblown a quarter of a century ago, Roger Cohen’s recent lament about the “<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/14/opinion/the-death-of-liberalism.html">death of liberalism</a>” is equally misplaced. Excessive pessimism is <a href="https://theconversation.com/pessimism-is-rife-optimism-naive-activism-is-the-best-tool-for-now-63458">replacing excessive optimism</a>, but both offer an equally distorted perspective on democracy’s place in the world. </p>
<p>Here there is value in taking a longer view. Doing so, it soon becomes clear that the immediate post-Cold-War era was an unusual time when liberal democracy was the only game in town.</p>
<p>Part of what may now be occurring is simply a realignment; a shift back to the kind of situation that has long prevailed – a world made up of a diverse range of governments, one of which is democracy. </p>
<p>In such a context, the value of democracy needs to be restated and defended, rather than presumed. And, in doing so, there is value in adopting a more tempered stance, one that appreciates the limitations and flaws of democracy and our attempts at supporting it, while retaining a quiet confidence in the reasons we continue to value this form of rule.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/61148/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher Hobson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The value of democracy needs to be restated and defended, rather than presumed. In doing so, there is value in adopting a more tempered stance, one that understands its worth but also its flaws.Christopher Hobson, Associate Professor, School of Political Science and Economics, Waseda UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/345742014-12-04T10:44:20Z2014-12-04T10:44:20ZPrague’s velvet: wearing off 25 years later<p>The United States had just gone through a bruising election, but in Congress Democratic and Republican leaders gathered to unveil <a href="http://www.voanews.com/content/havels-bust-gets-place-among-greats-in-us-congress/2527328.html">the bust of Vaclav Havel</a>, the playwright and first post-Communist Czech president and only the fourth non-American to be installed in this hallowed space. John Boehner and Nancy Pelosi praised Havel as a champion of freedom and human rights who used truth to defeat his totalitarian opponents.</p>
<p>Meanwhile in Prague, the city where Havel staged the Velvet Revolution twenty-five years ago, the streets were filled with <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30086495">demonstrators</a> who thundered at Milos Zeman, the current president: “Resign! Resign!” and waved red cards, the kind used in soccer to eject a player who committed an egregious foul. <a href="http://www.praguepost.com/czech-news/42945-zeman-not-oblivious-to-drop-in-popularity">Opinion polls </a>show that the demonstrators represent two thirds of their fellow citizens who find Zeman to be a failure on the international scene and a divisive force at home. </p>
<p>How did it happen that the Czech Republic’s presidency declined from the universally respected Havel to the present low? For an answer we have to look at today’s Russia and the crisis in Ukraine.</p>
<h2>The new Prague-Moscow axis</h2>
<p>When Putin annexed Crimea and sent weapons and military personnel into eastern Ukraine, the United States and the European Union responded with sanctions. The shooting down of the Malaysian airliner <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/news/malaysia-airlines-flight-mh17">MH17</a> hardened the Western response and caused some to speculate about a new cold war. </p>
<p>Inexplicably, President Zeman called on his EU and NATO partners to accept Russia’s annexation of Crimea on the grounds that the 1954 decree that transferred the region to Ukraine was “stupid.” He went on <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/news/malaysia-airlines-flight-mh17">Russian television</a> and denounced the sanctions as counterproductive. As far as the fighting in eastern Ukraine was concerned, Zeman argued, the West had no right to interfere since it was a civil war. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66089/original/image-20141202-20591-90aqac.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66089/original/image-20141202-20591-90aqac.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66089/original/image-20141202-20591-90aqac.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66089/original/image-20141202-20591-90aqac.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66089/original/image-20141202-20591-90aqac.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66089/original/image-20141202-20591-90aqac.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66089/original/image-20141202-20591-90aqac.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66089/original/image-20141202-20591-90aqac.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Good friends.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Vladimir_Putin_17_April_2002-2.jpg">www.kremlin.ru</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<p>But what about the weapons and troops dispatched by Putin, he was asked by then Swedish Foreign Minister <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TKY5RFvM2U">Carl Bildt</a> . None of that was true, he replied. He believed Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov who stated that not a single Russian soldier had entered Ukraine.</p>
<p>Zeman’s apparent willingness to believe Moscow is difficult to comprehend: anyone familiar with Czech history in the 1930s cannot fail to see the parallels between Putin’s takeover of Crimea and the Nazi Anschluß of Austria in 1938. Hitler argued that it was only an administrative measure that corrected a historical fluke, and since all involved spoke German, it was a “family affair” that was of no concern to outsiders. Sound familiar? </p>
<p>Equally strong similarities can be seen between today’s eastern Ukraine and the 1938 Czechoslovak-German crisis in the Sudetenland. Regarding the latter, Hitler insisted that the Czechs “terrorized” the German-speaking Sudetens living in Czechoslovakia and he needed to protect them by seizing the territory.</p>
<h2>Controversial conference</h2>
<p>Then President Zeman took a further step that created a gap between the Czech Republic and its EU and NATO partners. In September he attended a conference organized by Vladimir Yakunin, a billionaire who heads the Russian Railways and is also widely believed to have been a KGB operative. Yakunin heads a movement called National Glory of Russia that aims to protect the country from the corrosive Western culture. This does not, by the way, prevent Yakunin and his family from owning a house in London worth millions of dollars. As one cyberwag put it: he hates everything Western, except money. </p>
<p>Zeman used this questionable forum to demand an end to Western sanctions and to assert that the Ukrainian crisis was merely “a flu.”</p>
<p>When he encountered criticism at home and abroad for such pro-Kremlin statements, Zeman was nonplussed. He dismissed Havel’s accent on human rights in foreign affairs as naïve and declared during an official visit to China that he came to learn how to “stabilize society.” As if <em>en passant</em> Zeman added that Taiwan and Tibet were inalienable parts of China. Havel, by contrast, was on friendly terms with the Dalai Lama and a champion of Free Tibet.</p>
<h2>Expletives on the radio and dissing American beer</h2>
<p>Apparently invigorated by further negative comments, Zeman stated in a live interview on <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/czechrepublic/11207812/Czech-president-shocks-nations-in-expletive-filled-interview.html">Czech Radio</a> filled with profanities that the imprisoned members of the anti-Putin Pussy Riot group were “whores” who richly deserved their sojourns to the Gulag. Regarding Russian oligarch and Putin opponent Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Zeman opined that if he disapproved of something Putin had done, it was that he had failed to dispatch all the oligarchs to prison. </p>
<p>For his latest performance at the end of November, Zeman chose Kazakhstan, where he promoted Czech beer by dismissing its American competitor as “<a href="http://rt.com/news/208459-zeman-beer-czech-filth/">dirty water.</a>” He then expressed his “unalterable view” that Ukraine should be “neutralized and Finlandized” under the tutelage of Russia, and never admitted into NATO.</p>
<p>Before he became president, Zeman - an economist by training who joined the Social Democratic Party after 1989, became prime minister in 1998 but then left politics for 12 years – held mainstream foreign policy views. What has happened, and why so suddenly? Why does he now have to be reminded by his own foreign minister that all decisions regarding the future of Ukraine belong to its citizens?</p>
<p>As happens often when confronted with mysteries, some have resorted to conspiracy theories. But the principle of <a href="http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/General/occam.html">Occam’s Razor</a> teaches that the simplest explanations tend to be correct. Here is mine. </p>
<p>When he compares himself to Vaclav Havel, Milos Zeman sees his own smallness. This propels him toward attention-seeking pronouncements and other forms of political exhibitionism. </p>
<p>It seems incredible that the unity of the West, and the legacy of the Velvet Revolution, should be jeopardized by a man struggling with his own insignificance.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/34574/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Igor Lukes has received several Fulbright and IREX grants. He is the Honorary Consul General of the Czech Republic in Boston. . </span></em></p>The United States had just gone through a bruising election, but in Congress Democratic and Republican leaders gathered to unveil the bust of Vaclav Havel, the playwright and first post-Communist Czech…Igor Lukes, University Professor, Professor of International Relations and History, The Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies , Boston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/48092011-12-19T07:59:26Z2011-12-19T07:59:26ZVáclav Havel: a biographer’s account<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/6542/original/r6ftk2zz-1324265636.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Crowds in Prague mourn the passing of former President and national hero Vaclav Havel.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Singer</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Václav Havel has died aged 75. A poet and playwright, a political writer, dissident and a politician, Havel was the tenth and last President of Czechoslovakia, and the first President of the Czech Republic founded in 1993.</p>
<p>The Conversation spoke with Sydney University Professor of Politics John Keane, author of <a href="http://johnkeane.net/books/vaclav-havel-a-political-tragedy-in-six-acts/about-the-book">Václav Havel: A Political Tragedy in Six Acts</a> about Havel the man, and the legacy he will leave.</p>
<h2>Can you describe the Havel you knew?</h2>
<p>Havel was intense but witty, a clear-headed thinker and wonderful writer, a courageous individual blessed with a razor-sharp sense of irony; a chain-smoking man of letters whose fate was politics and (most people overlook this) who had a genuine taste for it, and yet who taught the world much about the dangers of unaccountable power. Two-thirds of his life was lived under conditions of dictatorship or totalitarian power. Yet he was a survivor. Then came the so-called Velvet Revolution of 1989. That changed everything in his life. </p>
<h2>Would you say there was more than one Havel?</h2>
<p>I think there were three: Havel was a playwright dissident, a politician and a statesman. Working backwards, when he finally left political office in 2003, he carved out the role of global statesman. In many obituaries during the past 24 hours, he is described as a giant and compared with figures like Nelson Mandela and Aung San Suu Kyi. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/6545/original/kn7xpw5c-1324267043.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/6545/original/kn7xpw5c-1324267043.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=695&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6545/original/kn7xpw5c-1324267043.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=695&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6545/original/kn7xpw5c-1324267043.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=695&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6545/original/kn7xpw5c-1324267043.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=874&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6545/original/kn7xpw5c-1324267043.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=874&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6545/original/kn7xpw5c-1324267043.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=874&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Václav Havel was admired as a playwright dissident, a politician and a global statesman.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Volfik</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The praise is understandable. He was a global champion of democratic virtues. He stood for integrity and he wrote and delivered some memorable speeches on subjects like the environment, globalisation and violence. There were some practical successes – for instance, he directed the <a href="http://www.thehrf.org/">Human Rights Foundation</a> in New York – but in his role as global statesman there were also setbacks. His support for the American and British invasion and occupation of Iraq attracted criticism, at home and abroad. There were some fruitless episodes, the chief being his attempt to broker a peace deal between the Palestinians and the state of Israel. It came to nothing. </p>
<h2>What about his life as a political leader?</h2>
<p>There was a middle period – Havel as politician. The standard story is that he was a reluctant politician; the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/18/vaclav-havel">Guardian in London</a> repeats that line in its obituary, which I show in my biography to be fundamentally mistaken.</p>
<p>He wanted very much to be the helmsman of the new Czechoslovak state. He clung on to power and there were moments when political office served as his aphrodisiac. Four presidencies in two countries over 13 years is proof of that. He arguably stayed too long; it eventually caused an abdication crisis in Czech politics. It’s true that Havel the politician notched up many important achievements. He was the first and the firmest champion of honest and fair-minded reconciliation with Germany over the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudetenland">Sudeten Question</a>. His longstanding wish that Czechoslovakia enter the European Union was granted. </p>
<p>As president, he stood for open-mindedness, for toleration and for civility, especially for humiliated people like the Romany. He had no truck with xenophobia and what he dubbed small-minded “Czech-centrism”. He tried to turn politics into fun, even adding a postmodern touch to politics as president. Within a few months of becoming president, the Prague castle was adorned with red white and blue BMWs, a festival of democracy was staged, blue jeans and t-shirts became cool and personal invitations were extended to Lou Reed and the Rolling Stones. Havel turned himself into what Germans call an “Ichspieler”. He played himself on a political stage before a domestic and global audience. He loved all of that, though it came at a high price. He learned a hard lesson: under democratic conditions, political careers very often end in failure. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/6551/original/vy43tjgk-1324268718.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/6551/original/vy43tjgk-1324268718.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=835&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6551/original/vy43tjgk-1324268718.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=835&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6551/original/vy43tjgk-1324268718.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=835&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6551/original/vy43tjgk-1324268718.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1049&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6551/original/vy43tjgk-1324268718.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1049&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6551/original/vy43tjgk-1324268718.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1049&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A guard commemorates Havel’s death in Prague.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Singer</span></span>
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<p>There was a moment of great honesty when he confessed that being in high politics resembled a prison sentence. He found himself caught up in the rough and tumble of a democratic transition. He had to face foxes like Václav Klaus, who out-performed and out-survived him. When Havel finally left office he was unpopular among sections of the Czech and Slovak publics. </p>
<p>Future historians will tell us that as a politician his achievements were mixed. He made more than a few errors of political judgement, most of which remain unknown outside his country. I’m deeply saddened by his passing, so I certainly don’t wish to be misunderstood when I say, in the spirit of what he called “living in the truth”, that an honest appraisal of Havel’s time as a politician shows that he had great difficulty adjusting to the mechanisms of representative democracy. </p>
<p>In the early days of his first presidency, for instance, he tried to change the constitution by a show of hands in parliament. That was roundly rejected, for good reasons. He later identified with the Greens, but initially had no affection for political parties. For a time, he even thought that in the transition to parliamentary democracy Czechoslovakia could do without a multiparty system. To an embarrassed <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helmut_Kohl">Chancellor Helmut Kohl</a>, during their first meeting, he proposed the abolition of parties, and the formation of one big party – Europe. His attitude reflected both the unhappy history of political parties in central Europe and his earlier preference for “anti-politics”. But in the context it was pie in the sky. </p>
<h2>Was he in some ways happiest and most effective in his early years?</h2>
<p>The earliest phase of his political life was Václav Havel as poet, playwright and dissident political writer. Along with his fellow Czechs, he lived through no fewer than eight regime changes during the course of the 20th century. In the face of military occupation, bossing and bullying, he displayed great personal courage, radical honesty and unflagging dedication to the values of a civil society. This is what he meant by “living in the truth”. It was a powerful philosophical idea and inspiring political slogan which helped to prepare the grounds for not only <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charter_77">Charter 77</a>, in its resistance to Soviet domination when everything seemed hopeless. It was the poetry for the dramatic Velvet Revolution of the autumn of 1989. </p>
<p>I think this earliest period of Havel’s life is the most inspiring. Much can be learned from the great works it produced. For me, two stand out. One is a play called The Memorandum (1965). Written in the tradition of the Theatre of the Absurd, it’s a toothy satire on the follies and dangers of concentrated total power. </p>
<p>The gist of the play is that the ruling authorities decide that they want more transparent and efficient communication with their subjects, in order better to control them. So they introduce a new language called “ptydepe”. Nobody can understand it; even the official instructors are baffled by its syntax, despite some simple rules, which specify for instance that the more frequently a word is used, the shorter it is. The word “wombat” is 80-odd letters long. When I first saw it performed in Prague after the Revolution, I was struck by the spirited audience reaction. They found the play riotously funny. It was. That’s why the communist authorities had banned it. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/6550/original/kt496x4j-1324268714.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/6550/original/kt496x4j-1324268714.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=357&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6550/original/kt496x4j-1324268714.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=357&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6550/original/kt496x4j-1324268714.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=357&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6550/original/kt496x4j-1324268714.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6550/original/kt496x4j-1324268714.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/6550/original/kt496x4j-1324268714.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Black flags fly at Prague Castle to commemorate Havel’s death.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Singer</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Havel’s other achievement during this early period is an astonishing political essay called <a href="http://history.hanover.edu/courses/excerpts/165havel.html">The Power of the Powerless</a> (1978). I edited its first English edition; a Chinese translation of my book-length account of its significance will be published next year. The essay is widely considered to be the greatest political essay written in Central and Eastern Europe prior to the events of 1989. Beautifully written and theoretically sophisticated, it contains a single but radical insight: the powerful, even if equipped with the most advanced weaponry and means of control, are actually no match for the powerless when they decide to withdraw their consent and non-violently refuse to play the game of the powerful. </p>
<p>So the power of the powerless in any context is their ability to reject current power arrangements, to behave differently, for instance by refusing corruption, lying, bullshit, bribes and the other trimmings and trapping of power. For that thought Havel was awarded a three-and-a-half year prison sentence. When I first met him, in Prague, he had just been released. He was mentally and physically exhausted, constantly on edge, anxious that he would be re-arrested. Yet he took risks, and did so with fearless dignity. He practised what he had written. That earned his essay regional and global fame. Rightly so. It was a trumpet blast in support of the idea that nonviolent resistance of citizens could triumph against any and all forms of top-down power. </p>
<h2>How should Havel be remembered? </h2>
<p>Democracies shouldn’t immortalise their leaders, past or present. They mustn’t allow anybody to sit on thrones. Yes, they need to preserve memories of stellar figures like Havel, particularly in our darkening times, when more than a few democracies are in trouble. But democrats should try to live without political heroes and myths of great leaders. I doubt whether Václav Havel would want to be put on a pedestal. That’s why I think he’s best remembered as a man who had the misfortune of being born into the 20th century, a figure whose fate was politics, a brave citizen who resisted its excesses, a public intellectual whose life and writings teach us much about the grave dangers of concentrated power - and the ability of humble people to throw off their chains. That’s quite a lot to remember.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/4809/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Keane does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Václav Havel has died aged 75. A poet and playwright, a political writer, dissident and a politician, Havel was the tenth and last President of Czechoslovakia, and the first President of the Czech Republic…John Keane, Professor of Politics, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.