The Economist

The EconomistJuly 21st 2018 15

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Why is populism so popular?

Your analysis of the reverse
wave of democratisation
towards authoritarianism was

fascinating (“Democracy’s
retreat” June 16th). There is a
fundamental question that
underpins this tragic dynamic.

If liberal democracy is so
superior to other systems how
come so many people have
turned away from it in mature
and consolidating democ-

racies? To answer it one has to
step outside the intellectual
hubris of policy practitioners
and allow for the possibility
that the liberal democratic

triumph after the end of the
cold war has also fostered a
sense of false ideological
supremacy.

Just like previous historical
instances of ideological hubris
this has stifled open and hon-
est discussion; in this case
about the true meaning of

pluralism. As a result the
ideological orthodoxy of the
post-cold-war liberal demo-
cratic creed has generated a
tidal wave of populism and

chaotic authoritarianism. If
Plato is right what comes next
will be even worse: tyranny.

LIUBOMIR TOPALOFF
Associate professor of political
science
Meiji University
Tokyo

The original campaign group

Bagehot claimed that Brexit-
eers are one of the most suc-

cessful pressure groups in
British history second only to
the Anti-Corn Law Leaguers
(June 16th). But what about the

campaign to abolish slavery?
Initially led by a quirky mix of
Quakers and evangelical
Christians it pioneered
innovative tactics including

the widespread boycott of
sugar tireless lobbying and
media propaganda.
What began as the eccentric
view of a swivel-eyed pressure

group became government
policy. Within 25 years the
immensely powerful Royal
Navy went from protecting the

maritime slave trade to shut-
ting it down and seizing slave
ships. The modern-day politi-
cal equivalent for the Brexit-

eers would be not merely to

detach Britain from Europe

but also to get Brussels to

dissolve the European Union.

MICK O’CONNELL

Associate professor

School of Psychology

University College Dublin

Too much information

Certainly the miracles of digi-

tal technology will eventually

find a use in medical practice

(“From A&Eto AI” June 9th).

Many in medicine however

are still feeling the sting of the

lastdigital revolution: the

introduction of electronic

medical records. Google Maps

can show me which direction

to take if I’m lost butmy elec-

tronic medical record can’t

graph a patient’s blood-sugar

values with insulin adminis-

tration over time.

Not only did these software

systems fail to live up to the

hype of safer fasterand cheap-

er care they have also proven

for many doctors to be a costly

confusing time-consuming

burn-out-inducing nightmare.

DR DANIEL PENNINGTON

Mason City Iowa

Nattering nabobs

Johnson pondered whether

“the country of Lincoln MLK

and JFK” is on an “irreversible

slide towards the rhetoric of

the sewer” (June 23rd). There is

nothing new about American

politicians “dehumanising

their adversaries”.

Supporters of Andrew

Jackson were angered by the

accusation thathis mother was

a “common prostitute”. His

wife Rachel was called an

adulteress (she mistakenly

thought her first husband had

secured a divorce before she

married Jackson).

Whether it was calling John

Adams “a hideous hermaphro-

ditical character” or Grover

Cleveland a “moral leper”

based on allegations that he

hadfathered an illegitimate

child the lexicon of American

political language has often

been filled with vitriolic

phrases. This is more an

indication of a functioning

democracy than symptomatic

of its inevitable demise.

CHAD IDEN

Columbus Georgia

Data sampling

One of the suggestions in your

special report on decentralis-

ing the internet is that big

companies should let startups

and small firms have access to

their data (without identifying

users) so that they can analyse

the data for themselves (June

30th). This is impractical be-

cause of the huge size of the

data files which small compa-

nies can’t handle. A better way

might be to require each of the

big companies to build a repre-

sentative sample of say 1m or

2m records.

If the goal is applying

machine learning in order to

reveal interesting patterns that

can be used for issuingpredic-

tions for new records from the

same population and when

the frequency of the value

under analysis (say whether or

not person likes product A) is

at least 1% 1m or 2m records are

quite sufficient for revealing

the valid patterns in the data.

Going from 1m to 100m im-

proves the accuracy just mar-

ginally and usually the im-

provement is negligible.

ABRAHAM MEIDAN

Chief executive

WizSoft

Tel Aviv

Solar eclipsed

You focused on the recent

brake on subsidies to the solar

industry in China (“On the

solarcoaster” June 16th). It is

also worth mentioning a new

and little-noticed change in

America. Amid the aggressive

imposition of Section 201 and

301 tariffs on solar imports the

Internal Revenue Service has

quietly extended the generous

investment tax-credit for solar

developers which was meant

to be phased out after 2019 for

four years. While Donald

Trump acts tough on China

the United States now has

some of the world’s most

generous solar tariffs as China

slashes its own. Perhapsthe

sun will indeed come out

tomorrow.

SHAWN KRAVETZ

President

Esplanade Capital

Boston

Meeting of minds

RegardingBartleby’s musings

on the futility of meetings

(June 30th) I can tell you that it

is easy to run them efficiently.

A meeting must have an agen-

da and the chair mustshut

down extra-loquacious pre-

senters who get carried away

and call on juniors to speak as

they may have a valuable

comment to make. But to

speed things up have a meet-

ing with no chairs and hold it

on a Friday at the end of day. I

guarantee it will be short.

RICHARD GYURO

Eagle Point Oregon

Bartleby’s bestiary of bother-

some babblers omits at least

two: the Archival Archies who

command the lore of how

things were once done; and the

Naysaying Nellies who have

never met a proposal for

change they approve of.

REED BROWNING

Granville Ohio

I have been trying to get our IT

department to make a small

change to the electronic calen-

dars we all use. Next to the

option of whether to accept or

reject an invitation to a meet-

ing I would like a big button

labelled “why?” with a size-

able question-mark. Alas

there has been no change.

STEFAN DOBREV

Gland Switzerland 7

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