SJS1: The Next Democratic Century

Title: The Next Democratic Century

Citation: Diamond, Larry. “The Next Democratic Century.” Current History (2014): 8-12. Print.

Author Credentials: The author of this journal entry was Larry Diamond. Diamond was a contributing editor and coeditor of the Journal of Democracy. He is an older man who works at the Hoover Institution and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. He has written one book; "The Spirit of Democracy: The Struggle to Build Free Societies Throughout the World" in 2008.

Summary: Democratic ruling is somewhat scattered right now in terms of location, and it is difficult to say what or who will follow this path and what countries will choose to override democracy and choose a more forceful type of government. A lot of countries that once held onto democracy, such as the United States, are struggling to really show how we implement democracy into our governmental systems. Other countries that never favored democracy, are leaning even further away from it than before. Many breakdowns occurred at the beginning of the 21st century because of military forces or smaller dilemmas, and affected huge areas such as Nigeria and Russia. Africa is the most common site of a degrading trend of democracies. Most democracies break down due to the mixed forms of government throughout the world. Formal democratic governments do not have the strength to fortify against more powerful forms of government, causing them to fall apart. The easy fix seems to strengthen the number and quality of solutions in all political areas of the world, but scientists and historians have explained that it is one of the toughest challenges to overcome such a global obstacle. Democracies also struggle by passing the "liberal" test. Many democracies have attempted to become a formal group with this test but have failed.  Different situations have occurred in different parts of the world that were focused on tearing democrats apart, and most of them succeeded. However, there is hope for the future of democracy. Countries such as Asia are economically develop and could potentially develop a democracy with their rising education and income levels. People's value priorities are shifting, so there is optimism towards the countries that seem to be struggling with the idea of a democracy at the moment. Some countries will most likely never become a successful democracy (such as Egypt), but the article says that anything can happen and today's events might not end up being as big of an influence as predicted. In essence, there is a lot to consider when discussing democracy throughout the world. Every section of the earth has a different population, culture, economy, and much more, which are all factors that contribute to democracy in the future, so there is no accurate prediction of what's to come.

Analysis: Diamond makes a strong argument in his article. He thoroughly discusses all of the ups and downs related to democracy, using facts of the past and real life events to predict ideas for the future. He discusses the influence of history on the present, which shows he knows the events that have taken place and has applied his knowledge of geography and different cultures to come up with a hypothesis. He supports his argument with significant evidence by discussing big historical events that have influenced modern geography. He includes information from major scientific discoveries to help support his hypothesis. He does a great job of distinguishing between fact and opinion; especially writing about how "nothing is certain". He shows that he has his estimates and uncertainties about the world and describes how they are different from the truth. I also believe he is a reliable source because his article comes from a scholarly journal that has been approved, and some of the information in his source comes from reliable discoveries.