*** FLORENT GUENARD: La démocratie universelle. Philosophie d’un modèle politique. Editions du Seuil (25 bld. Romain-Rolland, F-75993 Paris Cedex 14. Internet: http://www.seuil.com ). Collection « La couleur des idées ». 2016, 362 p., 23 €. ISBN 978-2-02-124147-1.
Who could forget the administration under George W. Bush deciding to launch war in Iraq in 2003 to defeat the regime of Saddam Hussein and introduce a lasting democracy in the country that was then supposed to spread throughout the Middle East? The world is still paying the price. That is not the subject of this book, however, in which a philosopher lecturing at Nantes University, Florent Guénard, considers how to prevent democratic universalism that arose from the French Revolution and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen from generating more anarchic expansionist attempts with untoward consequences.
The author’s reflection takes as its starting point an examination of democratization studies that arose in the 1980s, where intellectuals and researchers from a number of different disciplinary horizons accompanied the democratisation movement which can be considered to have started with the Portuguese Carnation Revolution in 1974 and ended with the collapse of the Soviet block. The paradigm they gave rise to was used as the theoretical foundation for active promotion of democracy around the world but also led to ‘theoretical impasses’ that still bear down on understanding of the expansion of democracy. Hence the need felt by the author to identify the problem that any theoretisation of the expansion of democracy comes up against, which leads him to go back to Plato’s restrictive conceptions of democracy, since Plato found it difficult ‘to determine what could be a paradigm of a democratic city’ and to imagine how this false model – which in his view was nothing but a ‘regime without a specific shape’ – could apply and inspire the history of societies. In the next two chapters, Florent Guénard revisits the responses provided to this problem. The first, pre-revolutionary, responses explore the various modalities of the democratic model,: the ‘singularity’ of a history given as an example for a city in quest of liberty for Machiavelli, ‘plurality’ of possible models because common good is multiple and has to be declined in function of the circumstances for Aristotle and Montesquieu, ‘generality’ of principles allowing a definition of legislation adjusted to the diversity of situations for Rousseau...
The terms of the question change with the French Revolution since the Declaration of the Rights of Man ‘gives substance to the idea of an assumed democratic universalism and feeds the hope of a limitless expansion of political freedom.’ However, there is nothing automatic about application of this fine principle, the author pointing out ‘the singularity of historical situations that cannot be reduced to the laws of the will,’ while highlighting ‘the slippages of a desire to totally and violently reshape the political space.’ Starting from a critical look at the revolutionary event, the question arises is less about the nature of the democratic model than about its universality. Two paths then open: the one is the path of Tocqueville and John Stuart Mill, who felt that ‘democracy is humanity’s destiny,’ which leads them to consider that the colonialism of France and England is fully justified because it was nothing but ‘the consequence of the obligation of the more advanced nations with respect to peoples considered still too young to be autonomous’; and the path that opens with the observation of the democratic slippages of the past century and the emergence of totalitarian regimes, which leads Schumpeter, for example, to consider that if democracy can still triumph, ‘it is because it is a procedure for designating governors, not a regime carried by the idea of a common good.’ Should democratic universalism therefore snub concepts of political philosophy in the name of realism? The author devotes his final chapter to verifying this. He points out that against the backdrop of globalisation, the idea of democracy ‘has no doubt lost some determination, but has gained in power of mobilisation,’ the Tunisian example leading him to consider that today it is far more than a concept because ‘for peoples in search of freedom and equality, it is an icon that allows collective action.’ Michel Theys
*** LEILA MOUHIB: L’Union européenne et la promotion de la démocratie. Les pratiques au Maroc et en Tunisie. Editions de l'Université de Bruxelles (26 av. Paul Héger, CP 163, B-1000 Brussels. Tel: (32-2) 6503799 - Fax: 6503794 – Email: editions@ulb.ac.be – Internet: http://www.editions-universite-bruxelles.be /). ’Etudes européenne’ series. 2017, 252 pp, €26. ISBN 978-2-8004-1613-7.
In this book, a young political scientist methodologically decrypts European policies for promoting democracy in the Arab world in the light of results in Morocco and Tunisia. She pays particular attention to the implementation from 2000 to 2017 of the European instrument for democracy and human rights, which from the start was sizeable in Morocco although it took the departure of President Ben Ali in January 2011 for it to become a reality in Tunisia. In this way, she also takes a look at the pertinence of the reproaches made of the European Union in terms of its relations with authoritarian regimes before the launch of the Arab Spring. More particularly, Leila Mouhib studied the work of Directorate Generals DevCo and Relex at the European Commission, and the activities of the delegations that since the Lisbon Treaty of 2009 have represented both the Commission and the European External Action Service. In this manner, the author demonstrates in a methodological, calm and collected way how the EU’s external action is fragmented and managed differently depending on whether it is done by the Commission, the Council or the European Parliament. This shows, points out Prof. Mario Telò in the preface, ‘a lack of horizontal coherence between the institutions’ and ‘low vertical coordination among the member states, particularly the large states, and the Union itself.’ Hence the need, he adds, not to dream of ‘unity at the foreign policy level’ but proper management of the EU’s action ‘for democracy in a medium- and long-term vision that is more coherence an more clairvoyant.’ (MT)
*** PANOS KAZAKOS (Eds.): La Grèce dans son monde. Entre realism et irréalisme dans le système international. Editions Patakis (38 Panayi Tsaldari, GR-10437 Athens. Tel: (30-210) 3650000 – Fax: 3811940 – email: bookstore@patakis.gr – Internet: http://www.patakis.gr ). ‘Sciences sociales et politiques’ series. 2016, 290 pp, €. ISBN 978-960-16-7142-0.
This book is a broad attempt to interpret and understand data that defines Greece’s international position in the post-Cold War beginnings of the twenty-first century. It aims to provide a concise, complete and convincing explanation of the country’s position in the modern world. Under the leadership of Panos Kazakos, professor emeritus at Athens University and director of research at the Greek European Studies Centre, the five authors, all are active at Pantheon University in Athens, show the weighty trends in the international system before steering their questionings to the regional area surrounding Greece and explaining the political options available to them, finally examining the ones they chose. In addition, the book does not restrict itself to ‘traditional’ aspects of international relations but opens up to the evidence that there is a continuum between ‘domestic,’ ‘economic’, and ‘foreign’ policies. (AKa)
*** NIKOS STELGIAS: La démocratie turque illibérale. L'hégémonie du néolibéralisme de la droite en Turquie et les coups d’Etat du 21ème siècle. Editions Papazisi (2 rue Nikitara, GR-10678 Athens. Tel: (30-210) 3822496 – Fax: 3809020 – Email: papazisi@otenet.gr – Internet: http://www.papazisi.gr ). 2017, 212 pp, €12.19. ISBN 978-960-02-3294-3.
This study enters into the heart of the intolerant political, social and economic context of President Erdogan’s nationalist and neoliberal Turkey. Researcher and journalist Nikos Stelgias considers Turkey as a sample where neoliberalism interacts with phenomena such as electoral authoritarianism and nationalism. By this means, he analyses the ideological, political and economic mechanisms used by modern capitalism to take control of a political and socio-economic field in so-called developing countries. Although he does not claim to answer all the questions he asks, the author does provide a methodological study of the main characteristics of the regime in place in Ankara which will lead the reader to a number of considerations and conclusions that he makes. He points out that a monopoly does not restrict itself to the political sphere, but can also spread into domains of a country’s social and economic life as well, of course, as domains of ideology. He thus helps readers understand the reasons why Tagip Recep Erdogan, his companions and also the Party of Justice and Development (AKP) have taken over the right. Thirdly, he highlights that in modern Turkey, the Kurdish separatist movement is the only effective opposition institution that is capable of challenging most of the options and strategies of the right wing in power in Ankara. (AKa)
*** IOANNIS MAZIS (Ed.): La géopolitique et les données géostratégiques de la crise syrienne. Editions Limon (2-4 rue Nikitara, GR-10678 Athens. Tel: (30-210) 3227323 – Email: ekd.limon@gmail.com). 2016, 176 pp, €26.50. ISBN 978-618-82668-4-1.
The power vacuum that was created following the start of the Syrian crisis in March 2011 acted like a magnet for various people’s regional aspirations, which has proved a major source of risk and instability for the entire system. Since the end of 2012, the Syrian crisis has seeped beyond the borders of Syria and turned into a regional war with international implications. For the researchers brought together in these pages by Prof. Mazis (economic geography and geopolitics at the Turkish Studies ad Modern Asiatic Studies Faculty of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens), the Syrian war has generated tension across the Middle East due to the doubts about Syria’s territorial integrity and the emergence of a new wave of military islamicists including Daesh and other movements. It is the various aspects of this war that are starting to directly affect the traditional breakdown of power in the region that are studied in this book, which also looks at energy issues and the competing pipeline plans that boil down to opposition between Sunni and Shia Islam. (AKa)
*** ANDREAS ANDRIANOPOULOS: Azerbaïdjan, leader au carrefour de l'Eurasie. Editions Epikentro (9 rue Kamvounion, GR-54621 Thessalonica. Tel: (30-231) 0256146 – Fax: 0256148 – Email: http://www.epikentro.gr ). 2016, 156 pp, €12. ISBN 978-960-458-663-9.
In history, few countries can claim to have been there from the beginning, to have marked the beginnings of human civilisation. One of them that can, of course, is Greece. Another is Azerbaijan in its niche in the mountains of the Southern Caucasus and spreading out to the beaches of the Caspian Sea. Why this book on Azerbaijan? What is the connection between Greece and this relatively remote country? In reality, many geopolitical, historical, economic and cultural questions bring the two countries together, which piqued Andreas Andrianopoulos’s interest. Minister six times in New Democracy governments, he is now director of the Institute of Diplomacy and International Developments at the American College in Greece (Deree College) and coordinator of the higher studies programme at the Leadership College, the author decided to cast an attentive eye over this country that is all too often lumped together with energy. Shedding light on what will be unknown territory for many, the author explains its geographic location at the crossroads between Europe and Asia. The unlimited underground energy reserves make this country essential for the energy security of Black Sea and central Asian Caspian Sea nations, not to mention the whole of Europe. He explains how the major international players are now turning to this country, which is being called upon to become a major economic and political pole in the long-term, although it is anchored in a region of the world that is full of turbulence and uncertainty. (AKa)