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There are two glaring problems with that. Imperial Germany had a legacy of democratic norms already - there was a legislative assembly, elections, political parties, political discussions in a free press etc. Also, Germany isn't in Eastern Europe.
And yet, somehow the state of Russia is explained by a lack of democratic norms.
If we consider the period before the outbreak of WW1 in Eastern Europe, we can absolutely surely say that the ideas of freely functioning political parties, democratic elections, rule of law, civil society, parliamentarianism, personal liberty, freedom of expression etc. had precisely zero influence in Russia, and that this was the case ever since the Russian state existed. And yes, this is true even when compared to imperial Germany.
Agreed except for the last sentence. You're taking token western institutions to pretend there were democratic norms, and (rightfully) dismissing the token Russian ones. Even if you want to carve out Germany as an exception that was somehow actually democratic, deep in their hearts (I can even give you "rule of law" as an institution that they had, to be a good sport), that still does not salvage your argument for why the democratization of the Eastern Block was a success. You even have to invent additional just-so stories to explain the relative "failure" of the democratization of the GDR, even though they it should have been the most successful of all, if "democratic traditions" were so important, and existed in Germany for such a long time.
Yes, I argue that the democratization of the newly annexed Eastern provinces of the FRG after 1990 is at this point largely seen as a failure by the West German establishment and their supporters. I think this is pretty much bunk because it ignores that a new political synthesis should have been worked out in the first place, a process that should have made reunification real instead of just a BS word for what in reality was annexation.
No, I think the most successful of all democratic transitions should have been and did in fact turn out to be the Czech, because it was the sole Soviet satellite state that in fact functioned as a democratic pluralistic republic before it was Sovietized; and because the Czechs were influenced by Holy Roman / Germanic culture for centuries before that, which made the country ripe for Westernization after 1989.
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Whoa, whoa, hold your horses. Imperial Germany was absolutely an Obrigkeitsstaat (elite-state?) ruled by a small number of people with very token democratic institutions that were meant to channel republicanism into wearing itself out and discrediting itself via fruitless procedures conducted within a powerless framework. That "democracy" never amounted to anything, wasn't taken very seriously by non-activists, and got absolutely bulldozed over by the actual rulers whenever they didn't jump according to orders. The Prussians in general and Bismarck specifically had a habit of allowing seemingly republican instutions to take the wind out of activists' sails, only to pull the rug out from under them and have riot police beat the shit out of them a few years later. The counterrevolution was still very much going on in Imperial Germany.
So the "legacy of democratic" norms was really the legacy that democracy was a farce. Does that square with your perception of inter-war Germany?
As opposed to Russia, where the meekest similar attempts even at creating token institutions were likely to land you in a Siberian penal colony. Degrees of differences do matter.
And there's a very large degree of difference between what seems to have been the historical reality in 19th and early 20th century Germany and what I assume most people would imagine when they hear "a legacy of democratic norms".
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That distinction does not matter though. When Bismarck implemented social democratic policies “to undermine the social democrats”, that last part is irrelevant. When John Lackland granted the Magna Carta he didn’t do it because in his heart he loved the freedom of his subjects more than his own power.
Any ruler will face pressure from his subjects. If we call that "democratic norms" I'll be even more confused as to why some countries are said to have them, and others are not.
Like, ages ago I was listening to a libertarian podcast talking about the news, and they had this clip of a western journalist grilling the Saudi king about why he doesn't just give equal rights to women. "You're the king", she said, "can't you just declare whatever you want?". His responses were a stream of evasions, centering around the theme of how much he loves his subjects. The libertarian hosts of the show were utterly clueless and were just making fun of how he's not answering the question, but in my opinion he was giving a clear and obvious response - this is what my subjects want, if I overturn the social order in such a drastic way, they'll hang me from a lamppost by tomorrow morning. Is that a "democratic norm"?
Yes, it kind of is. The more the average man’s opinion matters to the ruler, the more likely it is that the country is democratic. You get the least democratic norms when a noble horseman can trample on a hundred peasants in battle. Isn’t the main alt-right and alt-left anti-democracy argument that people’s opinion don’t matter, it’s all ‘elites’, ‘lobbies’ , hidden and less hidden power-brokers who decide? Even they agree that this average joe pressure is democratic in nature.
Ok, but that means there are absolute monarchies that are "democractic" and liberal democracies that aren't (and the "liberal" qualifier is important, because Botond already implied it's not really a democracy if it's not liberal enough, but your claim would imply the amount of liberalism is irrelevant). I can imagine a coherent view being extracted from this but I think it would boil down to "democracy" == "rule of the majority", but then I don't see how you can claim there's a tradition of democracy in the west.
I can't speak for everyone, but kinda. It's more that they punch below their weight. And like I said above - I can accept democracy being the will of the majority, but I think it derails the previous arguments more than clarifies them.
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