Steven Levitsky Quote
The strength of the American political system, it has often been said, rests on what Swedish Nobel Prize-winning economist Gunnar Myrdal called the American Creed: the principles of individual freedom and egalitarianism. Written into our founding documents and repeated in classrooms, speeches, and editorial pages, freedom and equality are self-justifying values. But they are not self-executing. Mutual toleration and institutional forbearance are procedural principles - they tell politicians how to behave, beyond the bounds of law, to make our institutions function. We should regard these procedural values as also sitting at the center of the American Creed - for without them, our democracy would not work.
The strength of the American political system, it has often been said, rests on what Swedish Nobel Prize-winning economist Gunnar Myrdal called the American Creed: the principles of individual freedom and egalitarianism. Written into our founding documents and repeated in classrooms, speeches, and editorial pages, freedom and equality are self-justifying values. But they are not self-executing. Mutual toleration and institutional forbearance are procedural principles - they tell politicians how to behave, beyond the bounds of law, to make our institutions function. We should regard these procedural values as also sitting at the center of the American Creed - for without them, our democracy would not work.
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About Steven Levitsky
A comparative political scientist, his research interests focus on Latin America and include political parties and party systems, authoritarianism and democratization, and weak and informal institutions.
He is notable for his work on competitive authoritarian regimes and informal political institutions. An expert on Latin America, Levitsky co-authored the best seller How Democracies Die with Daniel Ziblatt (an expert on authoritarianism in interwar Europe), warning that Donald Trump and the Republican Party were engaging in rhetoric and actions that have parallels with the breakdown of democracy in other regions and historical periods.