Past Present Future Fixing Democracy: Confronting the Strongmen
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Oct 22, 2025 
Historian Ayse Zarakol, an expert on international politics and authoritarianism, delves into the rise of strongman politics and its implications for democracy. She discusses how figures like Trump and Erdogan personalize power, eroding impersonal institutions. Ayse also explores the structural similarities among these leaders, the consequences of complacency, and the need for active civic engagement. She warns that the past may repeat itself if democracy fails to innovate and emphasizes the importance of ordinary citizens in reclaiming power.
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Personalized State Power
- Strongman captures personalization and privatization of the state better than autocracy or fascism.
- Ayse Zarakol argues strongmen make the state indistinguishable from the ruler's person and household.
Reversion To Court Politics
- Strongmen revive pre-modern court and household politics by making patronage central.
- Zarakol contrasts Erdogan's personalized rule with Atatürk's ideological modernization model.
Structures Select Strongmen
- Structural conditions select leaders suited to personalized rule across diverse countries.
- Individual biographies matter less than the macro forces that produce strongmen, Zarakol says.
