Welt am Scheideweg
Das Ende der Friedensordnung?
('World at the crossroads –
the end of peaceful order?')
Opposing systems are currently clashing heavily all over the globe. Opponents of liberal democracies are talking about 'saving our values' and 'cultures', which supposedly have to be protected from libertine neglect. This sounds surprisingly similar to the Russian propaganda, and is also being propagated by the mullahs in Tehran and the more or less united European Far Right. They also agree on another point: they are crossing their fingers for Donald Trump, because they know that the worst enemies of democracies emerge from their midst. We are experiencing a large-scale attack on the confidence in a representative, constitutional state, which the anti-democrat propaganda is wont to denounce collectively as 'the system'. At the same time, a policy debate on identity led by a minority ensures that the stock of common, shared experiences becomes smaller.
The European Parliament elections, and this year's upcoming local government and federal state elections in Germany, will throw the state of democracy in this country into sharp relief. Will the national social discourse come under even more pressure? Are all of the various opposing positions actually still willing to engage in a difference of opinions? Or is there nothing left to negotiate, anyway, in these times of alternative truths and dwindling certainties?
rbb24Inforadio reporter Harald Asel will confront these issues, taking the then latest state of affairs into account, in a discussion with the historian and co-founder of the Russian human rights organisation Memorial Irina Scherbakova, and the political scientist and author of works such as Welt in Aufruhr, Herfried Münkler.
