Word: autocrats
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...abroad in the courts of our consciences and of public opinion. Do we believe in Law, or in its subversion? Can we hold on to the wisdom of Socrates and the hopes and ideals of our founders, or will we bow to the cynicism and power of the autocrat? Can we express our ideals in the testimony of our lives and the process of our institutions, or do we accept our fall...
...recent months, Zimbabwe's octogenarian autocrat has watched as his country was ravaged, first by chronic food shortages, hyperinflation and political turmoil, and then by a cholera epidemic that continues unabated. Although Mugabe still locks up political opponents, most recently a deputy minister slated to be sworn into the new unity government, his rule has been weakened by a power-sharing agreement with an emboldened and entrenched opposition. His position is as insecure as it has ever been, and, if press reports this month are to believed, he and his confidantes are looking to Asia and to property...
...concealed his contempt for the “atheistic” values of liberal democracy and human rights. As an intransigent Slavic nationalist, he failed to see the roots of Bolshevik violence in the repressive habits of his beloved prelapsarian Romanov Russia. And his smarmy coziness with Putin, an autocrat for whom he had nothing but praise, belies his fidelity to the cause of a free society. It is hardly a stretch to link the current turmoil in Georgian separatist regions with Solzhenitsyn’s nefarious fantasy of pan-Slavic nationhood. Any honest obituary of Alexander Solzhenitsyn must take...
...Indonesia's relatively sluggish performance can be traced to the fall of Suharto - an autocrat who repressed political dissent but who, like other Asian strongmen of his era, was able to guide the country toward prosperity. After he was forced to step down in 1998 amid an economic meltdown, a new government set about erasing his dictatorial imprint; in 1999 an effort began to decentralize the once all-encompassing power of Jakarta, giving provinces and cities more influence over local affairs. Today, Indonesia's political system is more inclusive and remarkably stable. Some 34 political parties will participate in next...
...South Africa holds the ultimate leverage over Zimbabwe, because, as the country's electricity supplier, it could simply turn out the lights. But shutting down Zimbabwe would be considerably more painful for Mugabe's long-suffering people than for the aging autocrat himself, and the resulting refugee crisis would put a destabilizing strain on both South Africa and other neighbors. Yet Chris Maroleng, a Zimbabwe expert at the Institute for Security Studies in Pretoria, expects that regional leaders will toughen their stance in time. "Following the recount [of votes in Zimbabwe], we will probably see some kind of cohesive strategy...