Liberal democracy has a beautiful history, repeated in all languages: a history of freedom and progress, of infinite challenges to overcome and of individuals, groups and whole societies aspiring to a better world.

 This common rhetoric of a "brilliant future" doesn't fit with the here and now of disorganized, disoriented political communities with ideological and partisan divisions that only seem to intensify with time, and a state of noise and confusion that threatens to break them into a thousand pieces. Why does this world we characterize as democratic and liberal suffer from this bipolar disorder,swinging from self-complacency to exasperation?

 In this incisive and provocative essay, Víctor Pérez-Díaz explores the generalized malaise in liberal democracies and warns of the need to find out if, in this current moment of disorder, these societies are sufficiently prepared to face their representative and existential problems, and seeks out the root of their difficulties in doing so.

Translated by Julie Scales

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