The Narrow Corridor: States, Societies, and the Fate of Liberty

Any great power must enjoy a sufficient degree of internal political cohesion if it wishes to project power in the world. Authoritarian or totalitarian systems seek to do so based on top-down coercion and control. How can political cohesion be achieved in an open and democratic polity? Daron Acemoglu and Daron Robinson, who were awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics for their work on the role of institutions in generating prosperity, argue that cohesive and effective democratic political systems are the result of societies that navigate a narrow corridor in their evolution to create a “Shackled Leviathan.” This entails developing state institutions that are strong enough to enforce rules on society while preserving a civil society strong enough to check the state. If the state is too strong, politics will be focused on seizing and exploiting state power, which will undermine cohesion. If civil society dominates, state institutions will lack the capacity to govern. The challenge for a democratic great power is to find political cohesion through an equipoise of the state and society.