THIS IS A MEMBER-ONLY EVENT
Reading of Discussion:
“A Question of Order, India, Turkey, and the Return of the Strongman" by Basharat Peer, former editor of Foreign Affairs
Venue:
PURE Insurance Building
6263 N Scottsdale Rd, Suite 245
Scottsdale, AZ 85250
Peer begins his Prologue by saying “I grew up in the Indian-controlled part of the disputed region of Kashmir…India’s vaunted democracy seemed to stop short of …my hometown with rigged 1987 elections which led to rebellion in the winter of 1989-90 and insurgency and counter insurgency groups claiming more than 70,000 lives and turning Kashmir into the most militarized zone in the world”.
On 9/23/18 the travel section of the NYT’s reported that a British author Sir Walter Lawrence in 1895 predicted that Kashmir’s Gurez Valley’s spectacular scenery would become one the most popular tourist destinations in the future. 120 years later, Gurez is still waiting. The NYT’s also stated that “Following the Partition of India in 1947, Pakistan and India fought over the possession of Kashmir, initiating what remains one of the world’s most intractable conflicts”. Today in India, the differences between the more democratic and the more autocratic political divisions are even more striking.
Peer says “The cliché about India is that it is “the world’s largest democracy” but “By frequently repeating the descriptions, secular and religious nationalists overlook gross inequalities between the rich and poor, mistreatment of ethnic and religious minorities, segregation in cities, everyday violence against lower castes and ‘’’and rebellions in northeastern states near China, Bangladesh and Myanmar borders”
Peer argues that an increasing number of illiberal democracies. like Russia, India, Egypt, Hungary, Chad, Belarus. Cambodia, Singapore and Turkey, are unabashedly being led by undemocratic, aggressive strongmen”.
In Section One, Peer examines the rise of Narendra Modi of India and in Section Two, Peer examines the rise of Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey. Published in 2017, the book is very up to date.
Please join the PCFR Reading Group to examine the recent popularity of the anti democratic rise of political strongman.
We wish to thank our host Pure Insurance for the providing the facilities for our meetings.
