As we all know...

As we all know, accusations of lack of democracy is one of the main ways western countries demonize other countries and justify sanctions and war against them. But what is the state of democracy like in the countries considered enemies of the west actually like? For example, the DPRK, Iran, Cuba, Syria, Venezuela, Russia and China. As far as I know, every single one of these countries holds elections of one sort or another, but it's still common knowledge that these countries are all dictatorships, and the elections fake. What's the truth here? Which of these countries have legit elections and which are 100% dictatorships?

On a related note, I've noticed that liberals often treat democracy as a binary thing, an on/off switch. Either a country is a democracy (which usually coincidences with being good friends with the US) or it's a dictatorship, but it's obvious to me that democracy, rule of the people, exists on a spectrum. The US, "a democracy", has elections but a bunch of problems which compromise the legitimacy of the democratic process, such as normalization of huge amounts of money in politics, voter fraud, a few media companies having complete control over the access to information, etc. Conversely, if you study Stalin era USSR (an obvious "totalitarian dictatorship" to most people) you find that even that society had democratic elements to it. Categorizing countries into democracies and dictatorships is mostly a way to signal which countries are "good" and which deserve sanctions and military intervention.

Attached: 58de4fc3c4618838398b4585.jpg (790x444, 79.56K)

Other urls found in this thread:

b-ok.cc/book/2482948/67174c
b-ok.cc/book/2548797/920457
twitter.com/NSFWRedditGif

Common knowledge is not an organic thing, it is shaped by media and social media companies and state actors working in concert with them. Ans it is shaped purposefully against the ideological competitors of the US. To take Iran as an example, it has a rather byzantine structure of parliament, the president, the supreme leader, and the council of guardians. This is taken as "evidence" that it is not a full democracy, yet it is not at all that different from the US, where you also have for example the supreme court, unelected as they are, checking the power of the president and the congress. Checks and balances if we like you, sham democracy is we don't.

True, but this doesn’t mean that those countries aren’t actually undemocratic. Read Zizek. Imperialists cite dictatorship and human rights abuses as pretexts for intervention, but that doesn’t mean that shit isn’t actually happening. Obviously that in no way justifies intervention, but we shouldn’t let our opposition to imperialism blind us to the political realities in these countries.

all these countries are more democratic than the USA

the US is an oligarchy, and it's become entirely obvious to almost everyone

I didn't mean to imply it did. But I don't actually know, which is why I made this thread. I'm not gonna trust western media that, for example, Venezuelan elections are bullshit just because they say so. And even if you can find some flaw in Venezuelan democracy, I'm skeptical of the way countries are categorized into democracies and dictatorships, when most democracies are flawed in one way or another and dictatorships can have democratic elements (read the 2nd paragraph of OP).

I posted this thread on /marx/ as well, and here's Ismail's take:

Yeah, for Marxists democracy and dictatorship are not antithetical when talking about the state. The dictatorial element is always the main function, and democracy is always limited in some way by what class is in power (bourgeois democracy limiting the influence of the vast majority of the population, proletarian democracy limiting the influence of exploiting elements.)

I can't comment on Iran, but the DPRK has a modified form of the Soviet electoral system. To quote one bourgeois analyst, "The LaFollette Progressives could not have desired an electoral law which on paper provides for a more direct expression of the wishes of the electorate with the most modern safeguards for preventing a perversion of the national will than that presently in operation in the USSR."

Of course, it's the "on paper" part that's ultimately important. In practice the CPSU stage-managed the process. There was some liveliness and meaningful participation on the local level (towns, villages), but on the national level the ordinary Soviet citizen simply voted because he or she was expected to do so. Apathy was widespread.

I wouldn't be surprised if the DPRK has a similar problem.

As for Cuba, it has changed its system a fair bit since the early 90s. There are two books on its electoral system:

* b-ok.cc/book/2482948/67174c

* b-ok.cc/book/2548797/920457

As for Russia, Venezuela and (at least since 2012) Syria, their systems seem to meet the criteria of bourgeois democracies insofar as there are opposition parties. The argument is that the ruling parties have numerous in-built advantages (e.g. state media which gives them preferential treatment) which ensure their elections, but at the same time Putin and Assad do clearly have a lot of popularity in their respective countries, so while the electoral systems may be imbalanced, they'd still likely win even in a completely "fair" election.

China has a rather complicated electoral system, although it seems to be similar to the aforementioned USSR in the sense of greater interest and involvement on local levels, but apathy on the national level.

This is kind of out of left field, but bouncing off what you were saying, I recall this James Franco movie "The Interview" which is this satire about a group of journalists who are recruited by the CIA to assassinate Kim Jong-un, and the movie of course ends with Kim Jong-un being blown up. It reminds me of Slavoj Zizek's point that the ideal political subject today is someone who engages in politics in an ironic way, doesn't take himself too seriously, etc. when in fact all art is subject to political manipulation (there is one exception, though it doesn't apply in this case so I'll leave it for later).

Now, immediately after that movie came out, there were various shady groups in South Korea attempting to drop DVD copies of the film into North Korea via balloon. This ironic and ostensibly "apolitical" movie had been co-opted right away. The North Koreans have in my view an oppressive political system (to me, subjectively), but they quite correctly see the West as a wolf in sheep's clothing. That we're about "freedom" and we just like making jokes, but underneath all of that we really do want to blow up their country and kill their leader – and they have every reason to fear us and to keep their country closed from outside ideological contamination.

Attached: franco.jpg (1012x675, 87.17K)

Literally every country ever confirmed to be a dictatorship

At the risk of getting off track from OP's point, this user has the right idea. It frustrates me to no end that so may leftists use "NO U" as their argument against intervention when it really shouldn't matter either way if the countries in question are dictatorships or not. The real issue is that western intervention just makes things worse for the countries in question.

For what it's worth OP, it's purely anecdotal but I've met Syrian refugees who all say Assad is every bit as bad as he's made out to be. But they still vehemently want America to stay out of the conflict because they know America will only exploit it and make things worse. They were furious about the air strikes, for example. I also used to know an Iranian girl who said yes, Iran is an oppressive dictatorship, but it's entirely America's fault and America needs to stop pushing for war with it. Can't speak to the other common boogeymen America rattles its saber at.