How to beat the strongmen – and save democracy

The Bunker

Podmasters

News, Politics, Society & Culture, Government

4.6 • 984 Ratings

🗓️ 9 February 2023

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

How do we overcome opportunist strongmen leaders, who grab power while nations are in turmoil? As countries battle stagnant growth, high inflation and inept governments, we’ve seen a rise in autocracies. Charles Dunst, author of Defeating the Dictators: How Democracy Can Prevail in the Age of the Strongman joins Andrew Harrison to ask what the allure of these dictators is and why they are thriving in uncertain times. “The majority of autocracies don’t work, but in the richest ones there is no yearning for democracy.” “If you’re a developing country, the road to riches often leads to the Singapore model.” “Meritocracy has become a dirty word.” Support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/bunkercast Written and presented by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producer Kasia Tomasiewicz. Lead producer Jacob Jarvis. Bunker music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Jade Bailey. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Instagram | Twitter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	My name is Stan. I'm at. Nice to meet you. So you took up photography where? I've always loved
0:05.5	photography but I turn it into earning a living at 60. I enrolled on a day course.
0:11.8	Well college. I loved going to college. It's good you can retry. I'm enrolled on the day course. But college?
0:13.0	I loved going to college.
0:14.0	It's good you can retrain and do something.
0:16.0	Yeah, yeah.
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1:11.8	A lineup of Putin, Erdogan,
1:14.8	Shijin Ping and the Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko with the headline
1:19.3	The Bad Guys are Winning. That was the cover of the Atlantic magazine in December 2021. It was
1:24.5	the most depressing front page of any publication I'd seen in years and like all good
1:28.3	covers it crystallized a horrible truth. Inside Ann Applebaum talked about Autocracy Incorporated, the anti-Democratic movement
1:36.3	headed by strongmen that is still sweeping the world and which shows only few signs of slowing down.
1:41.6	This is the story of our time, the resurgence of
1:44.0	demagogues, political thugs, and might makes right in a world that seems to be
1:48.2	losing confidence in democracy. But what are we going to do about it? That's the theme of defeating the dictators, how democracy
	...

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