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Democracy must embrace diversity

Published: 04 Mar. 2025, 00:01

Park Sang-hoon

The author is a political scientist.

When politics demand that we feel a sense of crisis and take to the streets, they cease to be politics. To declare that problems cannot be resolved through reason is nothing short of coercion by fear. Fear and intimidation are tools of control, not of governance. As Otto von Bismarck once said, politics is “the art of the possible.” Politics must never lead us to a dead end. If the other side halts hostility and aggression, there must be room to restore peace and seek solutions. That is the essence of politics.

Politics that claim a monopoly on justice are dangerous. If a politician believes they need not listen to their fellow citizens, they must consider themselves perfectly righteous. To them, there exists no critic worth heeding. Perhaps they are more virtuous than the average person, but one thing is certain: As a leader, they are fundamentally antisocial. A ruler who refuses to learn from opposing views is a monarch. One who dismisses the law and insists only on goodwill is a dictator.

Protesters for the impeachment of President Yoon Suk Yeol rally near the Constitutional Court in Jongno District, central Seoul, on March. 1. [YONHAP]

Because we are fallible, we depend on others. Acknowledging that we can be wrong is why democracy is multiparty, not single-party. If political parties are only adversaries and feel no mutual responsibility, then politics ceases to function. Autocratic rule and totalitarianism thrive on suppressing dialogue and debate. Extremism and blind faith render us hostile and prevent us from seeing the possibility of progress.

Conservative People Power Party (PPP) Rep. Kim Gi-hyeon, center, raises his hands in prayer at a rally in Yeouido, western Seoul, on March 1. PPP Rep. Choo Kyung-ho, left, holds up a placard that says ″Please save Korea.″ [NEWS1]

Totalitarianism is an ever-present threat to democracy. Before democratization, we had military dictatorship and authoritarianism, but not totalitarianism. The danger of totalitarianism is the price of freedom. It seeps into democracy whenever we misunderstand the role of the public. Totalitarians seek to overturn the immutable too easily. They feed on aspirations to a perfectly just and ideal society. They despise and seek to eliminate political opponents and dissenting groups. Their greatest enemies are diversity, differences and conflict. Only unity in struggle, singularity of purpose and absolute conformity are celebrated. Difference and dissent become objects of hatred. And because of this, the pluralism that sustains party politics is destroyed.

A view of democracy that focuses solely on mass participation is defenseless against totalitarianism. Totalitarianism is always accompanied by large-scale mobilization. We must not forget that it thrives on rallying the masses. No totalitarian regime in history has been established without mass mobilization. No totalitarianism has survived without mass outrage. Whether voluntary or forced, totalitarianism requires an enemy to hate. It has shown that not only armies, but also enraged crowds, can become instruments of violence.

Totalitarianism relies on repression and control — brutal repression and control. And that is only possible because it involves the masses. Totalitarians know how to craft collective will and belief, how to raise funds and how to enjoy power. They are adept at using public fervor to crush opposition. As Bernard Crick, author of “In Defense of Politics” (1992), aptly put it, “Totalitarianism allows neither silent nor sleeping dogs to lie. Even those who bark without biting are not tolerated. Until they wag their tails in submission, they are flogged by the totalitarian crowd.”

Unlike traditional dictatorships, totalitarianism does not seek passive obedience. It demands wholehearted support and active participation. In our society today, those who mobilize mass demonstrations do so with an all-consuming enmity for their opponents. They vow to stake everything on a struggle against injustice. They shout that they will protect their leader from the law. Perhaps they are not antidemocratic, but if their democracy allows only them to be right, seeks to eliminate opposition parties and rejects the rule of law, then it is ultimately totalitarianism.

Those who claim to be the sole arbiters of justice will never tolerate anyone who does not submit. Our society today is filled with such people. Mockery and jeering have become their daily routine. Politics is conducted by those who cannot engage in dialogue or cooperation. In their world, democracy has no pluralism, and politics lacks the warmth of rational discourse. We are racing toward disaster. If we must go all the way to the end to see who is right — or if, in fact, we are all wrong — then so be it.

Translated using generative AI and edited by Korea JoongAng Daily staff.