Originally published in Greek by Kathimerini, 27 March 2022.
Until not long ago, Europe seemed to be an ensemble of democratic nations that, for the most part, had embraced liberal democracy. These nations displayed a determination to spread the spirit of Western liberal democracy to neighboring regions, including the Arab world, Islamist Turkey, and nationalist Russia. Recent and dramatic developments, however, have altered all that. The democratic experiment in the Arab world largely failed, Turkey regressed to an increasingly authoritarian form of government, and Russia proved to be a brutal dictatorship. At the same time, Britain’s withdrawal weakened the European Union, while the Trump era clearly showed that America cannot be relied upon as a permanent European ally or be seen as a model for clear-cut liberal democracy. The West became disengaged.
Continue reading “Europe’s most recent great drama and its protagonists”
