Beyond anti-liberal political catastrophism?

Abstract

In this chapter, two senses in which catastrophism is relevant to democratic politics are discussed. On the one hand, the adversarial attribution of impending catastrophes to political opponents is a usual practice in democracies and a common polarizing tool among extremist positions. On the other hand, actual disasters are often depicted as potential crucial factors for policy and eventually social transformations. Exploiting disasters as an opportunity for major shifts and substitutions also characterizes some illiberal, anti-liberal and authoritarian- leaning strategies to delegitimize democracies as we know them. Liberal democracies might partially tackle this destabilizing catastrophism insofar as they are able to invest in disaster preparedness policies while correcting democratic short-termism as much as possible. The social and political construction of coming catastrophes should thus evolve into a means to build the resilience of existing democracies and to counter internal and external challenges that contribute to their delegitimization.