Politics in the post-truth world

At home we are in the midst of an experiment where one player is playing off a playbook of post-truth elements

Viktor Orban is Hungary’s incumbent prime minister. He is in his second term now since 2010 when he returned to power after a brief stint from 1998-2002.

He was instrumental in gaining Hungary its freedom from the control of the USSR in 1989 after the Soviet Union dissolved and in acceding to NATO soon after as a new-found democracy. His thoughts and his hold over Hungary however have gone through a revisionist evolution where what he now runs in Hungary is what he himself calls ‘illiberal democracy’. For most it really translates into a method of assuming power through an electoral process but when in power exercise it not through a set of governing rules and principles but in accordance with what ‘the man’ at the helm thinks ought to be the principles and ideas of nationhood. And he has turned Hungary into a populist, ultra-right, exclusivist autocracy where Orban dictates the principles of nationhood and defines its qualifying criterion.

How did he do it? And what are the usual triggers for such a trend to take hold whether in communities, nations or in the minds of many who are slowly but surely nudging towards that ideology? Exclusivity is perhaps the key. It is the opposite of inclusivity and holds ‘a people’ different, superior, or separate from the other. In such an ideological bent the ‘other’ is as important to be abhorred or denied or abandoned. If there is one thing Europe has reacted to it is both legal and illegal immigration of the ‘others’ into their countries and societies. The politicians have usually found it a good platform to emphasise their uniqueness and instituted among the host countrymen hate for the outsiders who they think pollute their faith, values and their nationhood. Politics of ‘identity’ is now a popular theme with many to investigate and opine on in the literary and academic circles of the West. Francis Fukuyama, after having pronounced the ‘end of history’, is back in business with his new thesis of why and how the societies continue to evolve around ‘identity’ including in his adopted country, the United States.

Other than Viktor Orban, there are three others who have exhibited this great proclivity for exclusivism to be their main theme of politics: In history, the worst offender was Adolf Hitler who bellowed Aryan racial supremacy over all else and ventured to ‘cleanse’ the society through a targeted and planned extermination and genocide of the Jews from the German society, now recalled the Holocaust. Hitler was a fiery speaker and could bowl large gatherings over his patriotic and nationalist enunciations which gradually became entrenched in German minds as the defining parameters of their superiority over the rest. Alongside he added immense military muscle to German capacity and turned the whole nation into a war-machine which took on the world only to World’s and Germany’s own great and punishing detriment. The world lost its balance and ended up imploding through stresses generated by this man of self-serving beliefs. Through his gift of oratory he peddled to them the alternate reality of their entitled superiority over all others. War was another story and Goebbels became a famed liar who repeated this alternate truth to his people. Communication through all means became the tool through which the infallible persona of Hitler was not only sustained but turned into an abiding alternate truth.

The other two are Narendra Modi and Donald Trump who have in different measures instituted a similar vein in national ideology which ostracises the ‘other’. In societies that have coexisted peacefully for decades they first created a schism and then built on it to entrench ‘otherisation’. In all of this they sought political benefit. They were well served by the instant digital media beyond oratorical reinforcement of their message cementing hate even if losing the context at times. Trump had his ‘white’ audience to cement his politics by inciting fear of the ‘other’ while Modi had an ever sharper message poisoned with faith which has become the bane of millions in a ‘Hindu’ India. Faith thus is the new tool in various measures among those impacting the minds of the audiences and giving cause to the message. There cannot be a more dangerous weapon of extermination and intended extinction of the ‘other’ who may hold a different view than what is being purported as universal truth — manufactured in Goebbelian terms and repeated ad nauseam. Faith and race make a deadly combination.

Back to Orban. He manipulated his perpetual hold of the minds and sentiments of his people by invoking ‘Christian civilisation’ and ‘ethnic purity’ against offending cultures and traditions. He shaped his own rules of governance through his dominating majority in the parliament when most opposition stood toothless. He used the reframed laws to pay back his allies with material benefits even as those inflicted pain on his opponents. The rules are simple: “Make your enemies pay; let your friends prosper.” Orban ‘first targeted independent media by denying them state-funded advertisement, and then awarding licences to friendly businesses while denying opposing businessmen to flourish.

Orban’s party controls everything in Hungary — institutions, parliament — so he controls the law. Checks and balance of power within institutions of the government were simply dissolved. The rules and laws were tweaked to keep Orban in power. That is when state and society capture is complete. Till date we have only rued elite capture of the state and its resources; the next level is the elite capture of the society and people’s mind. That is when Frankenstein matures to its fullest form. In most struggling political economies it remains the principal challenge — the control of the mind through control of the airwaves, media and digital platforms. Orban has thought it all. Modi used it to great effect and so will others who seek exclusive control, least of which is state and its resource.

Turkey’s Tayyap Erdogan is one other example in this mold. He has deliberately worked to wean systems away from others to bring those under his monopolist control. In the case of Turkey and India the shell of democracy, as the world recognises it, has been retained but the machine-ware inside is totally replaced with what will deliver intended purpose. When a society’s software is reprogrammed it serves the master. The system thus is arrogated away in singular control. This is amazing societal reengineering. Turkey is similar in the way that Erdogan appropriated power to himself and in his person even if competing institutional and systemic structures are still strong enough to leave alternate space. Modi has his model sealed for decades with the right mix of faith-nationalism.

Closer to home we are in the midst of one such experiment where at least one player is playing off a playbook full of the post-truth world elements. If successful, illiberal democracy will ensue. As a complicated federation barely holding on to the hinges can we really absorb such a change of flavour?

Published in The Express Tribune, June 3^rd, 2022.

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