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Notes on El Salvador

mattlakeman.org

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Re: Notes on El Salvador

#11

Post by kovezd »

screye wrote: post #8
stainablesteel wrote: post #5

> Rather, the best case against Bukele is that he has created severe systemic political risk in El Salvador by converting the government from a democracy to a de facto dictatorship then hes in a good place to introduce some kind of monarchy, or personal transfer of power, someday. people want him to be dictator for life and he seems to be loved enough to receive it. democracy doesn't deal with gangs well enough to ma…

As a cynical idealist, I once tried to find 1 country of decent size that could escape the poverty/mis-governance trap while being a democracy. I found zero success stories. Every 20th century economic success story was a defacto autocratic nation. They only transitioned to democracy after they'd reached a certain level of development. (I excluded preexisting high HDI nations and ones that accidentally hit mineral go…

Interesting, you should publish your results.

And it does makes sense, in a way it would be similar to letting children (developing persons) make their own decisions.

The interesting question would be what is then, the best form of government for developing nations. Or even better, what are the required skill-set for leaders to bring development?

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#12

Post by roenxi »

screye wrote: post #8
stainablesteel wrote: post #5

> Rather, the best case against Bukele is that he has created severe systemic political risk in El Salvador by converting the government from a democracy to a de facto dictatorship then hes in a good place to introduce some kind of monarchy, or personal transfer of power, someday. people want him to be dictator for life and he seems to be loved enough to receive it. democracy doesn't deal with gangs well enough to ma…

As a cynical idealist, I once tried to find 1 country of decent size that could escape the poverty/mis-governance trap while being a democracy. I found zero success stories. Every 20th century economic success story was a defacto autocratic nation. They only transitioned to democracy after they'd reached a certain level of development. (I excluded preexisting high HDI nations and ones that accidentally hit mineral go…

The interesting one to watch out for is how often democracies form with the support of an existing democracy - I only have a loose understanding of the history but France seemed to have an outsized role in the US becoming what it is today. The failures (USSR, Republic of China for example) where democracy doesn't take on a wide scale are probably also interesting studies.

The key problem in setting up a democracy is that people are, on average, pretty dense. Doing things by vote doesn't cause stupid people to make good decisions. There is a real cultural element where the people involved have to be strongly against solving domestic problems with force, for evolution over revolution and also big believers in general liberty (otherwise you just get two factions fighting to use the big stick of government against the other).

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#13

Post by nemo44x »

screye wrote: post #8
stainablesteel wrote: post #5

> Rather, the best case against Bukele is that he has created severe systemic political risk in El Salvador by converting the government from a democracy to a de facto dictatorship then hes in a good place to introduce some kind of monarchy, or personal transfer of power, someday. people want him to be dictator for life and he seems to be loved enough to receive it. democracy doesn't deal with gangs well enough to ma…

As a cynical idealist, I once tried to find 1 country of decent size that could escape the poverty/mis-governance trap while being a democracy. I found zero success stories. Every 20th century economic success story was a defacto autocratic nation. They only transitioned to democracy after they'd reached a certain level of development. (I excluded preexisting high HDI nations and ones that accidentally hit mineral go…

You need a monarch to breed an aristocracy that takes care of its home by virtue of having skin in the game. A fake democracy immediately dissolves into an oligarchy which is self interested and will take whatever it can for itself up until the point a strong king rises up and smashes it. In this case Bukele.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#14

Post by GaggiX »

screye wrote: post #8
stainablesteel wrote: post #5

> Rather, the best case against Bukele is that he has created severe systemic political risk in El Salvador by converting the government from a democracy to a de facto dictatorship then hes in a good place to introduce some kind of monarchy, or personal transfer of power, someday. people want him to be dictator for life and he seems to be loved enough to receive it. democracy doesn't deal with gangs well enough to ma…

As a cynical idealist, I once tried to find 1 country of decent size that could escape the poverty/mis-governance trap while being a democracy. I found zero success stories. Every 20th century economic success story was a defacto autocratic nation. They only transitioned to democracy after they'd reached a certain level of development. (I excluded preexisting high HDI nations and ones that accidentally hit mineral go…

I would think of the Third Polish Republic.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#15

Post by pottertheotter »

fvdessen wrote: post #9

Gang crime seem to be a common weakness of democracies. There's a notable list of countries that had to resort to elect a quasi-dictator to get rid of gangs. As my hometown is coming to grip with a bubbling gang war, I wonder if there is a better way.

What country, if you don’t mind saying?

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#16

Post by WheelsAtLarge »

This has been the best one place summary of the Salvadorian situation I've read so far. I've had some understanding of the situation through Salvadorian friends and a few news articles that tried to give a quick synopsis. But I can say that what I read in this post concurs with what I know and expands greatly on it. I suspect that there's got to be a few errors. It's inevitable simply because it's a one-person summary. But kudos to Matt Lakeman, he did a very good job.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#18

Post by nemo44x »

kovezd wrote: post #2

The article does present a very objective evaluation of Bukele as a person, and statesman. One has to deeply wonder about Political Theory after reading stories like this.

Which political theory? I think Machiavelli was more or less right. Many old texts are quite wise. I’d agree most political theories from the 20th century on is pretty much bunk unless cynical, oligarchical subterfuge is your goal. But if you dig deep enough and long enough into the past there is a lot of wisdom. Bukele in many ways expresses many of these.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#19

Post by throwme_123 »

screye wrote: post #8
stainablesteel wrote: post #5

> Rather, the best case against Bukele is that he has created severe systemic political risk in El Salvador by converting the government from a democracy to a de facto dictatorship then hes in a good place to introduce some kind of monarchy, or personal transfer of power, someday. people want him to be dictator for life and he seems to be loved enough to receive it. democracy doesn't deal with gangs well enough to ma…

As a cynical idealist, I once tried to find 1 country of decent size that could escape the poverty/mis-governance trap while being a democracy. I found zero success stories. Every 20th century economic success story was a defacto autocratic nation. They only transitioned to democracy after they'd reached a certain level of development. (I excluded preexisting high HDI nations and ones that accidentally hit mineral go…

it works in civilization (the game) too

switch to democracy for a long time and it's a mess

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#20

Post by fvdessen »

pottertheotter wrote: post #15
fvdessen wrote: post #9

Gang crime seem to be a common weakness of democracies. There's a notable list of countries that had to resort to elect a quasi-dictator to get rid of gangs. As my hometown is coming to grip with a bubbling gang war, I wonder if there is a better way.

What country, if you don’t mind saying?

Belgium, the Antwerp port is the main entry point for drugs in Europe, and there is high demand for drugs in Belgium itself as well. The gangs used to be 'quiet' but there's been a drive-by shooting wave in Brussels recently, which re-opened the debate about what to do with all this.

I know the situation is in no way comparable with what's going on in South-America, but there are also well known spots in the city where drugs are dealt openly, people even queue, which is a bit of a wtf

Of course the extreme right is riding on this hard and winning a lot of popularity as a result

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