THE THIRD WAY: BETWEEN DEMOCRACY AND AUTHORITARIANISM IN THE 21ST CENTURY
THE THIRD WAY: BETWEEN DEMOCRACY AND AUTHORITARIANISM IN THE 21ST CENTURY

Summary/Abstract: For a long time, academic discussions about democratic decline had the air of light salon conversations—ineffective and out of touch with reality. There was a major gap between the theoretical discourse on decline, filled with nuances and detailed explanations, and the surrounding reality, marked by a harshness incomprehensible in academic circles. More seriously, however, both the latter and the dominant political discourse in democratic countries not only lived under the illusion of a temporarily interrupted victory but, above all, held the belief that democracy had become a historical given—that the only natural trajectory of human society’s political evolution was democratization and that any obstacles were, more or less, easily surmountable. This study seeks to capture the process of the „disenchantment” of democratic systems, along with the deep causes and implications of this phenomenon, which carries profound historical significance. For the first time in the past century, democracy is no longer the absolute reference point for those seeking the common good in human society; instead, it risks becoming just another discourse, with diminishing influence.

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