Last week Evgeny Morozov once again questioned the democratizing potential of the internet:
[A]uthoritarian states and modern democracies are very much alike: both have embraced hedonism as their main and only political ideology. The recent outburst of techno-utopianism in the West may thus be just another futile attempt to imagine a world where the purest ideal of Athenian democracy, uncorrupted by special interests and popular culture, is not only possible but could actually be facilitated by its more corrupt, frivolous, and somewhat culpable western sibling. This, of course, is an illusion. Citizens of modern authoritarian states face a choice between hedonism with stable prosperity (their status quo) and hedonism with unstable prosperity the hedonism that may follow a tumultuous transition to democracy. Stability wins, with or without Twitter.
Dreher agrees:
Isn't this the techie libertarian version of the neocon idea that all people around the world are liberal democrats at heart, just waiting to be liberated from authoritarianism by force? Both are predicated on a view of human nature that is rather romantic. Huxley had it right, alas. I'm not making a pitch for or against any particular political system, understand (I am quite fond of liberal democracy myself, but agree with John Adams that "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other"), but only arguing for skepticism of the Western view that everyone wants to be like us.