The Caesar problem remains open

If I haven’t blogged until now about the midterm election, it’s because I find the state of the world too depressing. Go vote, obviously, if you’re eligible and haven’t yet. How many more chances will you have?

While I’m (to put it mildly) neither especially courageous nor useful as an infantryman, I would’ve been honored to give up my life for the Israel of Herzl and Ben-Gurion, or for the America of Franklin and Lincoln. Alas, the Israel of Herzl and Ben-Gurion officially ceased to exist last week, with the election of a coalition some of whose members officially endorse discrimination against Israeli Arab citizens, effectively nullifying Ben-Gurion’s founding declaration that the new state would ensure “complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race, or sex.” The America of Franklin and Lincoln might follow it into oblivion starting tonight, with the election of hundreds of candidates who acknowledge the legimitacy of elections only when their party wins.

The Roman Republic lasted until Caesar. Weimar Germany lasted until Hitler (no, the destroyer of democracy isn’t always literally Hitler, but in that instance it was). Hungary lasted until Orbán. America lasted until Trump. Israel lasted until Netanyahu. After two millennia, democracy still hasn’t solved this problem, and it’s always basically the same problem: one individual, one populist authoritarian, who uses the machinery of democracy to end democracy. How would one design a democracy to prevent this the next time around?