Page 113 [113]
Democracy and distrust | 111
the machinery of the state as cartel parties’ - with falling membership and declining
electoral participation, disproportionately so at the lower end of the social scale.
(Streeck 2017, 6)
Consequently, according to Berman and Kundnami, what we can see in
Europe since the millennium is that
[clenter-left parties moved to the center on economic issues while some center-right
parties moderated their positions on traditional values, immigration, and other
concerns related to national identity. A gap developed between voters’ preferences
and what the traditional parties were offering. Old partisan allegiances lost their hold
on voters; not a few drifted into apathy. Seeing an opportunity, right-wing populist
parties reshaped their profiles to better meet disaffected voters’ preferences. Such
parties began picking up votes and did especially well when issues such as immigration
and national identity came to the fore, highlighting the contrast between populists
and traditional parties. (Berman and Kundnami 2021, 23-24)
From this point of view, the rise of populism in Europe can be seen not as a
response to the economic crisis of 2008, or the migration crisis of 2015, or
the more and more problematised issues of gender equality, LGBTI-rights,
and so on. On the contrary, the rise of populism is a reaction to the strong
convergence of the other parties on these issues. Many Europeans simply feel
that these parties are “all the same” - there is no difference between them,
i.e. “no one represents us”.
LIBERAL DEMOCRACY UNDER CONSIDERATION
The idea that liberal democracy is the ultimate, most developed, and most
desired form of democracy became almost unquestionable after 1989. This
kind of democracy is built on the merits of liberal constitutionalism, including
the rule of law, the division of powers, and human rights, on the one hand,
and on wide-range political representation based on universal suffrage, on
the other (Hobson 2012). According to Fareed Zakaria, the balance between
these two basic components of democracy (liberal constitutionalism and
representative democracy) defines the nature of the system: one can function
without the other, but democracy without liberal constitutionalism can only
be an illiberal one (Zakaria 1997).
It took almost two decades after 1989 to begin the discussion about the
problems and deficits of liberal democracy. This coincided with the economic
crisis of 2008, but the crisis itself was only part of the overall problem. To
understand the crisis of liberal democracy, it is important to highlight that
these problems have at least two different origins. The worldwide financial
and economic depression, rooted in the functioning of liberal democracy,