In this
essay I discuss the relevance of the concept of political entrepreneurship to
an understanding of political outcomes that have substantially affected
personal and economic freedom in different countries. The essay has a particular
focus on authoritarianism. My understanding of that concept is based on the
view of Hans Eysenck that people who have an authoritarian personality are
attracted to the possibility of oppressing others. People who have authoritarian
values see such oppression as justified. Authoritarian governments oppress
people by restricting their personal and economic freedom to a greater extent
than other governments.
The essay
focuses on political outcomes which seem incongruent with underlying cultural
values in a range of countries. It suggests that political entrepreneurship has
influenced the ideologies currently reflected in personal and economic freedom
in those countries. It also considers the current role of political entrepreneurship
in harnessing cultural and economic grievances to pursue a range of different
ends in the liberal democracies.
The essay
draws on some of my previous research on the extent to which cultural values
can explain authoritarianism and on the influence of cultural backlash and
economic grievances on political outcomes in liberal democracies. That research
is summarized prior to considering the nature and relevance of political
entrepreneurship.
Can
cultural values explain authoritarianism?
My answer
to that question is that cultural values do not fully explain authoritarianism
– the ideologies of some governments are at variance with cultural values. The
best way to explain how I came to that conclusion is by referring readers to the
accompanying graph which shows levels of economic freedom and personal freedom
for 85 countries. Please note that the personal freedom scale on the vertical
axis is in reverse order with highest levels of personal freedom at the bottom.
(The graph has previously been published in an article in The Savvy Street in
2023.)
Please
focus on the labelling of data points. I have attached country labels
only to those data points where freedom ratings are substantially different
from predicted levels based on indexes of emancipative and facilitating values
which were constructed using World Values Survey data. The methodology for
constructing these indexes is explained in the
Savvy Street article and on this blog (here
and here).
The colour of the labelled points depends on whether freedom is greater than or
less than predicted—green if greater than predicted, red if less than
predicted. The size of the labelled points is larger if both personal and
economic freedom are greater than or less than predicted.
It is clear
from the graph that freedom ratings of most of the countries with low
personal and economic freedom are substantially lower than predicted by corresponding
emancipative and facilitating values. The countries in which both personal and economic freedom is less than
predicted include China, Iran and Venezuela. It seems obvious that suppression
of liberty in those countries is a product of the ideologies of the governments concerned rather than the
cultural values of the peoples.
The graph
also shows that a substantial number of countries with relatively high personal
and economic freedom are performing better in that regard than can readily be
explained on the basis of prevailing values. Most of the countries concerned
are not the high-income countries of North America, Western Europe, Oceania,
and East Asia that come to mind when one thinks of countries with relatively
high levels of economic and personal freedom.
The
existence of countries in which freedom levels are substantially greater than
predicted by facilitating and emancipative values suggests that government
support for economic and personal freedom may precede or accompany the
evolution of facilitating and emancipative values. The transition to high
levels of economic freedom often takes place over an extended period. As
market-friendly economic reforms promote the growth of economic opportunities,
this could be expected to lead to the gradual evolution of facilitating values
supporting higher levels of economic freedom. The growth of economic
opportunities could be expected to encourage people to place higher value on
personal autonomy and to become more trusting of others.
Milton
Friedman observed that economic freedom “promotes political freedom because it
separates economic power from political power and in this way enables the one
to offset the other” (Friedman, Capitalism and Freedom, 1982, 9). As
economic development proceeds, the evolution of emancipative values provides
additional support for personal freedom.
The
correlation between economic and personal freedom is strikingly evident in the
graph. There are not many countries with relatively high personal freedom and
low economic freedom, or vice versa. Argentina—which stands out as the only
country having high personal freedom despite low economic freedom—helps
illustrate why that is so. In the published article, I suggested:
“In Argentina, the decline in economic freedom over the last 20 years has been accompanied by worsening economic prospects, which seem likely to lead, before long, to an economic and political crisis. Hopefully, the political response to the crisis will be to restore greater economic freedom and make personal freedom more secure, rather than to restrict personal freedom to suppress criticism of government policies.”
A few months after that comment was published, Javier Milei
was elected president of Argentina and has successfully introduced policy
reforms to expand economic freedom. (Unfortunately, I cannot claim that my
essay was influential in bringing that about.)
Cultural
and economic grievances as explanators of political change
In the preceding essay on this blog I discuss the question: “Is
cultural backlash a major determinant of political outcomes in the liberal
democracies?” My intial focus was on the view which Pippa Norris and
Ronald Inglehart presented in their book, Cultural Backlash: Trump, Brexit and
Authoritarian Populism (2019), that the spread of post-materialist values has
induced a cultural backlash among cultural conservatives. They suggested on
that basis that the combination of authoritarianism and populist rhetoric is a
threat to liberal democracy.
In my view, Norris and Inglehart were mistaken in
attributing cultural backlash to the spread of post-materialist values. I
argued that it would be more correct to attribute cultural backlash to the
illiberalism of progressives who have been advocating what Yascha Mounk has
described as the identity synthesis (see: The
Identity Trap, 2023). The identity synthesis has provoked a backlash
because it rejects neutral rules like equal opportunity and free speech in
favour of action to promote the interests of particular groups that have
suffered from discrimination in the past.
Some recent research by John Burn-Murdoch, published in the Financial
Times ‘Why the
Maga mindset is different’, March 7, 2025) has suggested that over the last
20 years the values held by people who identify with the right wing of U.S.
politics has moved closer to the values of people in Turkey, Russia and China
than to people who identify with the right wing of politics in Europe. It
remains to be seen what impact, if any, this apparent retreat from classical
liberal values will have on the institutions of liberal democracy in the United
States.
Norris and Inglehart acknowledge that economic grievances also
play an important role in encouraging people to support policy remedies
proposed by populists. In that context, I have referred to some research published
in an
essay on this blog that has highlighted the adverse impact that slower
economic growth can have on life satisfaction, particularly of young people. I
suspect that the
longer-term slowdown in economic growth in the liberal democracies might be
more important in generating support for populist policies than are grievances
that can be related directly to the impact of import competition or
immigration.
However, we
live in a world where the policies that political leaders sell to voters depend
on how voters perceive reality. Those perceptions are not always accurate. Some
opinion leaders on both the progressive and conservative sides of politics attempt
to sell voters a distorted view of reality. As I wrote that I was reminded of a comment I made in my review of Michèle
Lamont’s book, Seeing Others, 2023. I suggested:
“On the question of factual accuracy, Lamont’s narrative, which suggests that the workers have reason to be angry with the wealthy one percent, seems to me to be just as questionable as Donald Trump’s narrative which suggests that the workers have reason to be angry about globalization and immigration. Neither of those narratives promotes an accurate understanding of economic reality.”
The concept
of political entrepreneurship
Catherine De Vries and Sara Hobolt have suggested that competition
between political parties in European countries is like competition in economic
markets. In both contexts long-standing dominant players (firms or parties) may
be challenged by disruptive new players. The central objective for both challengers
and incumbents is the control of government and the delivery of public policies.
Political entrepreneurs play a key role because a party that engages in
successful political policy innovation can enjoy an effective monopoly on an
issue and reap the consequent electoral benefits. (De Vries CE, Hobolt SB.
Challenger Parties and Populism. LSE Public Policy Review. 2020; 1(1): 3, pp.
1–8. DOI: https://doi.org/10.31389/lseppr.3)
De Vries and Hobolt were writing about multi-party systems
in which several political parties are competing for power. However, a similar form
of competition occurs when an innovative political entrepreneur within a major
political party challenges established leadership factions by offering a
product that is more appealing to supporters of the party.
Valentina Ausserladscheider has contributed
to an understanding of political entrepreneurism by providing a framework to
consider reasons for the political success of Jörg Haider, the leader of the
Austrian Freedom Party, during the 1990s. Haider’s winning formula was based on
a policy mix of authoritarian and and neoliberal policies, which was
particularly successful during a time of economic turmoil and uncertainty. (See
Chapter 9 of Culture,
sociality, and morality : new applications of mainline political
economy edited by Paul Dragos Aligica, Ginny Seung Choi, and Virgil Henry
Storr, 2021).
Ausserladscheider emphasizes that the strategies of political
entrepreneurs are not determined solely by voters’ ideological positions.
Successful political entrepreneurs don’t offer the same policies as their
competitors. They advance their political ambitions by focusing on niches in the
marketplace of ideas that established parties do not satisfy, and on winning
support by emphasizing the problem-solving capacities of their ideas. For
example, the entrepreneurial strategy of far-right parties is their
“nationalist and nativist core ideology”, leading to policies such as immigration
restrictions that are claimed to solve a range of problems.
As illustrated by the example of Jörg Haider, the strategies
that political entrepreneurs follow to attract support can result in political programs
that offer a mix of libertarian and authoritarian policies.
The influence
of political entrepreneurs
From a
cursory inspection of the accompanying graph, people who have rudimentary knowledge
of global politics would have no difficulty identifying political entrepreneurs
who have historically been major players determining outcomes in many jurisdictions
where economic and personal freedom seems substantially at variance with underlying
cultural values. There are good reasons for that. Media coverage tends to focus
on political leaders, the challenges they face and the policies they adopt.
The role of
political entrepreneurship is not always obvious in liberal democracies where
the institutions of representative government have been respected for many
decades. However, it doesn’t make sense to assume that changes in public
opinion will be automatically reflected in public policy even in countries with
representative government. In general, the responses of political markets to
new information (e.g. poll data about shifts in public opinion on particular
issues) depend to a much larger extent on decisions by big players than do responses
to new information in financial and commodity markets.
A better
understanding of the reasons why political entrepreneurs behave as they do might
help us to assess whether current political developments are likely to expand
or constrain economic and personal freedom. Those outcomes depend on both the motivations
of the individuals concerned and on the social and economic context in which
they operate.
Like other
humans, political entrepreneurs are motivated by a range of factors. It is
usually unrealistic to assume that they are motivated solely by a desire to
maximize social welfare (whatever that means), to maximize the number of votes
they obtain, to maximize personal wealth, or to obtain the perks of the office.
Given the nature of their occupation, however, it seems reasonable to assume
that political entrepreneurs obtain more satisfaction than most other people from
constructing ideological narratives and selling them, and from exercising the political
power required to implement policies.
In some
instances, ideological predilections may play a dominant role. For example, while
social and economic context helps to explain why revolutions occurred in China
and Iran in the 20th century, the repression of individual liberty following
those revolutions stemmed directly from the ideologies of revolutionary leaders
- Mao Zedong in China and Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran.
Similarly, while
the economic problems confronting the United States and Britain during the
1980s provided contexts in which substantial changes in the direction of
economic and social policies could be contemplated, the responses of Ronald
Reagan and Margaret Thatcher owe much to their respective commitments to economic
freedom. The reforms currently being pursued by Javier
Milei in Argentina seem to be similarly motivated.
Looking around the world, a range of different ideological predilections
seem to be playing a role in policies advocated by political entrepreneurs. For
example, we see ideological considerations playing a role among those seeking opportunities
to expand the welfare state, to redistribute wealth, to promote “equity” for
community groups which have suffered from discrimination in the past, to save
the environment from CO2 emissions, to pursue international humanitarian goals,
or to pursue nationalist goals by restricting immigration, raising trade
barriers, and withdrawing from international organisations. Some of those policies
have potential to impinge adversely on economic and personal freedom.
As we have seen earlier, even if political entrepreneurs are
motivated mainly by a desire to exercise political power, the innovative aspect
of their role requires them to focus on niches in the marketplace of ideas that
established parties (or factions) do not satisfy. They seek to attract support from people who are
discontented with current economic and social outcomes by emphasizing
the problem-solving capacities of their ideas. Their success in attracting a loyal support base of
customers who are willing to help them to sell their narrative depends to a
large extent on the strength of competition from politicians selling different
narratives, and on the extent of resistance by journalists and members of the
public who consider their narratives to be incorrect or that their policy
proposals are unworkable, unconstitutional, unethical, or otherwise unhelpful.
In my
opinion, the ability of some political entrepreneurs (from both conservative
and progressive sides of politics) to persuade large numbers of people to
accept false narratives is posing an increasing threat to liberty in the liberal
democracies. False narratives pose a threat to liberty because they often provide
a basis for false beliefs that problems can be solved by restricting personal
and economic freedom. For example, the personal freedom of people who refused vaccinations
for Covid was restricted inappropriately in many countries because of false
narratives that unvaccinated people were likely to spread infection. And economic
freedom is currently being restricted in some countries through imposition of
higher import barriers on the basis of false narratives about the impact of free
trade.
A few
decades ago, people seemed to have been more willing to put their trust in
political commentators who took pride in remaining politically independent and
well-informed. Those commentators were able to expose false narratives to a
greater extent than now occurs, and thus to limit the influence of political
entrepreneurs who base their policies on falsehoods.
In recent
years, however, mainstream media has become increasingly polarized. The rise of
social media seems to have aggravated the problem. Many exchanges of views about
political issues on social media consist largely of recitations of false
narratives promulgated by political leaders.
Some commentators
who are independent and well-informed can still be found in both mainstream and
social media, but prevailing cultures may need to give greater respect to the
search for truth before those people will have sufficient influence to
discourage political entrepreneurs from promoting false narratives.
Conclusions
Authoritarian
and libertarian political outcomes don’t just appear out of nowhere. Underlying
cultural values that have evolved over long periods of time go some of the way
toward explaining levels of economic and personal freedom in different
countries. However, political entrepreneurship also plays an important role.
The role of
political entrepreneurs is most apparent in those countries where underlying
cultural values are less supportive of economic and personal freedom. Political
entrepreneurs have played an important role in some of those countries in promoting
either more or less freedom than would be expected on the basis of underlying
cultural values.
The role of
political entrepreneurship has been more constrained in those liberal
democracies where the institutions of representative government have been
respected for many decades.
However, the
ability of some political entrepreneurs (from both conservative and progressive
sides of politics) to persuade large numbers of people to accept false
narratives is posing an increasing threat to personal and economic freedom in
the liberal democracies. Polarization of the media means that such claims are now
less subject to independent scrutiny than they were a few decades ago.
Recent political developments are raising the question of whether cultural change in some liberal democracies has emboldened some political entrepreneurs to challenge conventions regarding government respect for judicial rulings on the legality of their activities. Governments that do not perceive themselves to be bound by judicial interpretation of laws and constitutions are unlikely to have much regard for individual liberty. Any government which claims that its actions are beyond legal challenge because they reflect the general will of the people is showing obvious signs of authoritarianism.
Addendum
Chris M Sciabarra has given me permission to publish the following comment, which he has provided by email:
"I just read the essay and enjoyed it; I'll have to give a bit more thought to it. You make some very good, persuasive points, though there are some claims that I need to process a bit more. I think the whole concept of political entrepreneurship has some weight here. I wonder how, for example, it might mesh not only with public choice thinking, but also with Hayek's insights about how the 'worst get on top' when political power becomes the only power worth having. If that's the case, then political entrepreneurship in a populist age morphs into a kind of political con game that attacks the very roots of liberal democracy---something you acknowledge in your conclusions.
One of the issues that concerns me is that while there was a backlash against the "identity synthesis" of illiberal progressives, I don't think that was the key factor that influenced the outcome of the election. Incumbent parties lost all around the world, whether they were perceived as 'right'- or 'left'-leaning. In the US, of course, Trump won over Harris. In the UK, the Conservative Party was defeated. The Liberal Democrats lost in Japan, while in France, a coalition of left-wing and centrist parties gained ground. And so forth. I think that inflation, stagnant wages, housing affordability, etc. led most incumbents to defeat because whoever is in power is the party that takes the blame for the conditions on the ground.
That said, I also think that the "identity synthesis" on the illiberal left has only been replaced by a different kind of "identity synthesis" on the illiberal right, given the right's embrace of nationalism and, in many cases, a virulent form of nativism, riding on profound anti-immigrant fervor. Not to mention the illiberal right's obsession with scapegoating the smallest of minorities---like transgender-identifying people, who make up about 0.6% of the population. This is as much of an illiberal right-wing play on identity politics as anything we've seen on the left."
