How close are the ones to? Although provocative, the question is not purely rhetorical, nor of course geographical. The US government’s decision to develop military forces on the pretext of arresting immigrants without papers, the steady and open attack on specific universities, supposed to be nurseries of subversive ideas of the left -wing academic, and the “funding” Procedures and administrative mechanisms inevitably give rise to extremely alarming associations.
“The US is a very large, complex and decentralized country. And if you think of other cases of states that followed the authoritarian path, you will find that, perhaps not accidental, they were all centralized. Take the example of Hungary. If one manages to control Parliament, the Constitutional Court and to secure the President’s consent, then there is not much that can stand in the way. On the contrary, in the US federalism complicates the issue. When things are forced, it is clear that individual states have some power. The federal government cannot move on to certain issues without the cooperation of the states. “ says in “Step” Jan Werner Miller.
Professor of Social and Political Science at Princeton University, author of important monographs for populism and constitutional patriotism, Miller is one of the coldest and insightful voices in the field of democratic theory. “There is a lot of already happening in the US that would not happen in a democracy. We have seen things that can not even be considered as normal. Some of them are due to pre -existing weaknesses, others to processes in progress here for a long time. For example, the transformation of the Rebuban Party into a kind of personalism ».
Is there a moment or event that could signal clear passage to an authoritarian situation? “If one examines other cases of authoritarianization, what people say afterwards is that there was not necessarily a specific moment that marked it. When did the government change in Hungary or Turkey exactly become impossible? Did this happen a specific day? “ Miller notes. As he points out, a process of authoritarianization is usually gradual, and the interaction of different factors also plays an important role, “Which you can only see in the aftermath”.
Are we facing the first acts of building a police state, as some argue? Or are we dealing with an attempt at a political tooling of violence to rally the harsh right -wing audience in a difficult period for the US government? Our interlocutor hesitates to make predictions. As he says, the army’s development on an internal question is really shocking, but it does not come as a thunderbolt. He recalls that during his first term, Trump had appeared in Washington’s Lafageton Square after the violent dissolution of the bulky demonstrations for his death George Floudholding a Bible and having the army leader next to him Mark Miley. Despite the late apologies of the latter, who acknowledged that his presence created the impression of the army’s involvement inside the country, many had been in favor of such a involvement. ‘Many of the parties involved’stresses Miller, “They concluded that they did not do enough in 2020, when those huge demonstrations took place. So they seem to have said, “This time we will use everything, and we will just cause the kind of images, just the spectacle we want to present to those who support us” “.
Is the production of such “spectacles” part of Trump’s political strategy? “It is clearly one of the goals. It is striking how much it has invested in developing optical strategies. A few days ago a video was posted by the Director of the Intelligence Service to warn of the dangers of a nuclear war. It is similar to pseudo-packed videos published by the government for years Orban, which say “we are against war” but in fact reproduce Russian propaganda “.
Miller teaches one of the universities of the so -called Ivy League. To what extent does he feel that his academic work and his academic freedom have been limited by the movements of the American administration in universities? “I do not think there is such a level of intervention in academic freedom at this stage. But, as we know very well from other countries, this is not necessary to achieve the massive results you want. What I can tell you, based on my personal perception, is that many people change tone, so say. People who wouldn’t expect that they would do so change the way in which some questions ask. Sometimes, as long as you send a strong sign from the top to produce a bullied result. “.
As for research funding cuts, what happens is for Miller completely absurd. “How can one ‘sell’ these huge cuts in scientific research as ‘politics’? What can he say? “You know something, we’re one step before we make a significant discovery in the treatment of pancreas cancer, but we will put ice on research” ». An important question about him has to do with whether these interventions will be seen as something reversible or if, on the contrary, academic staff will consider that once they were done once, even if they are overthrown, they may be repeated.
In a recent article in “Guardian”, Miller cited an extremely interesting concept introduced by the Hungarian sociologist Balid Magiarthe concept of ‘state-state’. In such a state, Magiar argues, the “political family” reaps a number of benefits, but in return offers dedication and omere.
The particular element, according to Miller, is that in the case of Trump we are dealing with his real, biological family, which is reaping a series of economic benefits. “But to get back to my original observation, the US is a big and complex state. It is too early to conclude that everything works on these terms. There are, of course, clear signs of the emergence of such a state » Miller points out. What, as he says, is causing reflection is that all this is raw, without any attempt to convene: “Unlike the EU countries, for example, where it matters how the other member states or the Commission see you, no one here gives a penny about how others see him …”.
