Consider now benevolent autocrats, much maligned but often misunderstood. Where do they stand in the falling twilight of the struggle between Democracy and Authoritarianism? They are known by many names — authoritarian pragmatists, for example — but they all seem to have former Singapore Prime Minister, the late Lee Kuan Yew, as their foundational role model. Lee, who died at the age of 91, ruled Singapore in his image for 30 years, post-British colonialism, dramatically elevating the quality of life in his prosperous city state. And it has become something of a case study among African statesmen, particularly Paul Kagame of Rwanda. “Rwanda has come as close as any in Africa to emulating Singapore’s rags-to-riches rise, though not in the same spectacular style -- annual per capita income is still roughly 100th that of the Asian state’s,” write Edmund Blair and Clement Uwiringiyimana for Reuters.
What is a benevolent autocrat? Economist William Easterly defines it as "an undemocratic political leader credited with high growth," or, to put it simply, a “soft dictator” more concerned about his or her country’s growth than their personal Swiss bank account. Lee Kuan Yew, the ex-Prime Minister of Singapore, is seen as the exemplar of this category. Singapore is decidedly not a democracy and yet its GDP growth is on par with Western nations. And in other metrics — home ownership; health spending; life expectancy; net migration; biodiversity — Singapore favorably compares to the United States and European countries. Everywhere in the so-called Second and Third Worlds, the Singapore Model is esteemed. Opinions, of course, vary as to the lagcy of British colonialism and the illiberalism of the present regime. But the affluent city state carries immense soft power in the so-called Third World.
From Farah Stockman of the NYT Opinion:
Consider that in 1960, Singapore and Jamaica had roughly the same gross domestic product per capita — about $425, according to World Bank data. By 2021, Singapore’s G.D.P. had risen to $72,794, while Jamaica’s was just $5,181. It’s no wonder that Lee Kuan Yew has become a folk hero. It’s not hard to find people from South Africa, Lebanon and Sri Lanka praying for their own Lee Kuan Yew.
Last month, President Biden hosted his second democracy summit and gave a speech about the epic global struggle between democracy and autocracy. Singapore — a U.S. partner rated “partly free” by Freedom House — was not invited. But Washington’s talking points about the imperative of democracy ignore a simple fact: Some autocrats are admired because they get results.
Lee Kuan Yew is such a statesman. “Singapore is half the size of London but with two-thirds its population,” writes Carlton Tran in The Guardian. “It has an efficient bureaucracy, a corruption-free government, clean air, safe streets, excellent schools, affordable healthcare, high home ownership, and the third highest per capita income in the world.” One cannot ignore Singapore’s size and relative homogeneity in its success. But Lee, a Cambridge-educated scholar, was influenced more from British colonialism and the Japanese occupation of his city state than he was by Paine’s Common Sense. The goals of his particular benevolent authoritarianism were a delicate tightrope walk between the hegemony of his Political Action Party and the well-being of the citizens. “Lee’s benevolent authoritarianism has become an art, but the principle remains the same – keep the people well fed and they won’t revolt,” Edmund Blair and Clement Uwiringiyimana note.
Benevolent autocrats are not full-on Autocrats, to be sure. But they are also not quite Democrats as well. To place them in the category of Putin is naïve to say the least. But they are not that ideologically distant from, say, an Erdogan or Netanyahu. All share a certain right-wing patriotism of blood and citizenship, though Rwanda is on standby to receive UK immigrants, which will be a difficult, but fascinating political act to pull off without destabilizing his own domestic situation. But is best to stay judicious when examining benevolent autocracies, so as not to contaminate the observation process. They are a part of the Third Way of governing — neither Democracy nor Authoritarian regime, exactly — and they merits some serious discussion.
Take: Kagame. Paul Kagame’s Rwanda is a perfect example of the limits of the West’s anti-authoritarian propaganda that seeks to cleft the world into bipolarity, as in the days of the Cold War. And, why? Because History likes halves? How does such a mode of arrogant thinking affect the rest of the world, outside of Washington and Moscow and Beijing? The notion that Rwanda, right after the genocide, could have become a functioning Democracy is utterly ludicrous. And yet hyper-Western partisans will insist, due to Kagame’s admittedly alarming human rights record, that one-party rule by the Rwandan Patriotic Front has somehow “failed” and is therefore, ideologically, strengthening the hands of Putin and Xi and “the global authoritarian threat.” Nonsense. That Rwanda’s one-party rule comes with a “dark side” is obvious; but has Rwanda’s benevolent autocracy failed its people? In the short term — in terms of post-genocide societal stability — I’d say no.
We in the West have a tendency to idealize democracy in all cases and, by contrast, to demonize “authoritarianism,” always and in everything. But what if Rwanda, as partisans of anti-authoritarianism desire, became a democracy on July 16, 1994, a day after the genocide +officially+ ended? Wouldn’t that have been a massive steroid shot to ethnic stratification on a terrifying scale? Is there any serious political thinker that believes that the survivors of the genocide would not, in that moment, deliver their vote in the service of terrible vengeance? Why would a Tutsi, who lost roughly 800,000 countrymen, ever vote for a Hutu? So democracy, in that sense, would serve as a force multiplier of Rwandan ethnic stratification.
Benevolent autocrats — after the Rwanda model — have their advantages. They offer stability, especially after societally traumatic episodes like war, genocide and famine. And in those moments of tranquility, they get shit done. “In the World Bank's 'Doing Business' report 2019, which describes how economically friendly the 190 countries in the world are, Rwanda ranks 29th – the second-best African nation after Mauritius,” writes Antonio Cascais in DW. One of the characteristic features of a benevolent autocrat — as opposed to that of a mere dictator — is a commitment to the economic growth and stability of their country. In other words, less Belgian chateaus and Dachas on the Black Sea.
There are also of course great disadvantages to benevolent autocrats. Economic stability is the teleological endpoint of a benevolent autocracy, at the cost of liberty. What they gain in societal stability and efficient governance, benevolent autocracies lose with regards to their Freedom House score. Free speech and dissent in general are overreacted against, as possible sources of destabilization (that, clearly, they have in common with mere dictators). Rwanda, for example, is 23 out of a possible score of 100; the UAE is 18 out of a possible score of 100. Rwanda’s prosecution of the Congo wars between 1996 and 2003 can only be properly construed under the category of atrocious, largely because of their history and their orientation (negligible) to human rights.
In closing, countries like Rwanda, the UAE and, to a lesser degree, Uganda, are not “autocracies.” They are a blend of autocratic efficiencies (there are some) and democracy. Benevolent autocracies are particularly attractive in Africa because they present a post-colonialist Third Way. Further, they can form bilateral relationships on particular issues with both democratic and authoritarian regimes. There are no ties to either side. It is something of an organic continuation of the “non-Aligned” movement. And immanently logical. Who can blame small African countries from not wanting their natural resources from becoming inextricably entangled with former colonial powers or even former allies, like Russia and China?