Ordinarily, benevolence and dictatorship next to each other do not belong in the same sentence. However, early in the 20th century, historians have used the phrase "benevolent dictatorship" to describe several notable governments that were run as such. The concept was not without controversy nor was it free from criticism.
First, let's consider the following perspectives: (a) Good parenting in any household is, and should be, a benevolent dictatorship; (b) Businesses, any business from a handful of employees to mega corporations can only be run successfully through dictatorship; (c) In the military, along the entirety of the chain of command, dictatorship is both the language and the operating system. So, parents of young children, CEOs and military commanders share those attributes?
"I believe in benevolent dictatorship provided I am the dictator".
--- Richard Branson
Richard Nicolas Branson, mega entrepreneur, business visionary.. may have been semi-facetious when he said that so let's have another quote to kind of add another facet of governance before we get into governments - the leaders and the governed .
"To my knowledge there are no good records that have been built by institutions run by committee. In almost all cases the great records are the product of individuals, perhaps working together .. In reality outstanding records are made by dictators, hopefully benevolent, but nonetheless dictators".
— Peter Cundill
Now, this takes us to the business of running a country.
"The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination".
---- Voltaire
Votaire was the pen name of François-Marie Arouet, an 18th century writer and philosopher who advocated for free speech, freedom of religion and the separation of church and state.
This may sound surprising but a democracy, or democratically run nations, is relatively new as practiced but the concept had been around early on in the long history of humanity. Plato wrote "The Republic" in or about 375 BCE but it is still today a college source of reference materials in philosophy and political science. Commonly used summary for The Republic is that, in three words, it is about justice, virtue and happiness that should define good governance. Plato spoke of a philosopher-king - capable of leading an empire/nation with equal justice for all, a virtuous man who must aim for the attainment of happiness for the people.
The Roman Empire picked it up after the collapse of the Greek Empire but the rule of and by the people did not take hold once the Caesars took over the reign of governing, despite the existence of the Roman Senate, where Julius Caesar was unceremoniously assassinated by several senators right on the senate floor.
It was less than three centuries ago when the idea of democracy was resurrected and dubbed an experiment by historians upon the birth of a new nation in the New World.
After 1776, the new concept was emulated around the world that had several monarchies toppled over like dominoes. Where monarchies remained, they merely stayed on as some sort of national symbols while the real government function rested in parliaments or other formats of democracy that allow for the people to choose their leaders.
Democracy - what a perfect way to run a government. But, is it?
Fast forward to today and we find that, generally speaking, governments are run either as a democracy or dictatorship. The thing though about modern dictatorship is that it can rise from a democratic system that can perversely devolve into an autocratic rule.
We can come to agree that both ideologies have had their successes and, inarguably, their failures. I think I've covered this in more detail in another blog earlier.
Now, which were those "notable governments that were run as such" referred to in the first paragraph above?
Obviously, we cannot cover all of them but it is worth mentioning here that there are at least a dozen books by different authors written with the exact same titles, "Benevolent Dictator/s".
Please refer to the two portraits (below) of two leaders in the modern era:
Left: Viktor Fyodorovich Yanukovich; we will use his initials as VFY
Right: Lee Kuan Yew, who journalists would also write about as LKY
VFY currently in exile and living in Russia is a former president of Ukraine who was driven out of office in February, 2014 by parliamentary vote, later charged in absentia for corruption and deaths of many protesters and political enemies during his tenure as president. He was found guilty and sentenced to 13 years in prison. Fitting the definition of a kleptocrat for enriching himself while in office, resulted in a collective label attributable to corrupt public officials in Ukraine the word "Yanukism". Indeed, upon his abrupt and unceremonious departure Ukraine was in deep economic trouble while his lavish lifestyle was exposed by the amount of luxury cars, homes and financial records and traces of foreign bank accounts that revealed the extent of the fortunes he amassed while in office. He is not the only one who took refuge in exile.
From 1946 to 2012, almost 200 former dictators and monarchs either left their respective countries in exile or were assassinated in a process that is now defined under the general category of regime changes.
LKY, if he were alive today, will have been 100 years old a few days ago on September 23. Worth mentioning because it means that LKY lived through WWII, regionally as the War in the Pacific, and the Japanese occupation of the Malay Peninsula.
LKY, widely acclaimed as "the father of Singapore" and deservedly so, is also known to have taken Singapore from a third world country after the end of the war up to the time that it separated from the Malaysian Federation to first world status in less than three decades after his country's independence in 1965. For one leader to have done it well within one lifetime at the helm of unopposed leadership for forty years was an extraordinary feat unmatched in the modern era.
"With overwhelming parliamentary control at every general election, Lee oversaw Singapore's transformation into a developed country with a high-income economy within his premiership. In the process, he forged a highly effective, anti-corrupt government and civil service".
He advocated for civic nationalism backed by meritocracy and integrating instead of dividing the multiracial residents of the island by making English, Malay, Chinese and Tamil as official languages but, to take advantage of the efficiency of English in international commerce and trade, English became the lingua franca. LKY grew up in an English speaking family and learned Chinese later in life. During the war he learned to speak Japanese and worked as an interpreter at one time. He spoke Malay fluently which helped when he negotiated Singapore's entry into the Malaysian Federation, and the subsequent separation from it two years later to gain independence.
LKY had his detractors on issues of press freedom, political protests but not with regards to corruption or enriching himself while in power. To achieve and maintain an honest government LKY believed that ministers were well paid. Later, he proposed that top civil servants, including judges should be paid at par with professionals in the private sector. He recognized that teachers should be well paid if the future of the country hinges on the education of the youth.
LKY was a pragmatist and his tenure could best be described as "semi-authoritarian" and as a "hybrid regime" came the phrase, "guided democracy".
VFY and LKY give us two contrasting portraits. However, is this what wins the case for a benevolent dictatorship? Let's read the quote below:
"The longing for a leader who knows what is in her people's best interests, who rules with care and guides the nation on a wise path, was Plato's idea of a philosopher-king. It's a tempting picture, but it's asking the wrong question. In political history, philosophers moved from a preference for such benevolent dictators to the ugly realities of democracy when they switched the question from "who could best rule?" to "what system prevents the worst rule?"
-- Rachel Kleinfeld
(Kleinfeld is a senior fellow in Carnegie’s Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program)
This musing has not adequately answered the question to every reader's satisfaction but I'm afraid we will be asking it again and again.
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