The Demon in Democracy

Ryszard Legutko lived and suffered under communism for decades—fighting with the Polish anti-communist movement to abolish it. After living for two decades under a liberal democracy, he discovered that these two political systems have much more in common than one might think. Both stem from the same historical roots in early modernity and accept similar presuppositions about history, society, religion, politics, culture, and human nature.

In The Demon in Democracy, Legutko explores the shared objectives between these two political systems, explaining how liberal democracy has, over time, lurched towards the same goals as communism, albeit without Soviet-style brutality.

Both systems, says Legutko, reduce human nature to that of the common man, who is led to believe himself liberated from the obligations of the past. Both the communist man and the liberal democratic man refuse to admit that there exists anything of value outside the political systems to which they pledged their loyalty. Furthermore, both systems refuse to undertake any critical examination of their ideological prejudices.