A turning point was reached as early as the mid-1970s and certainly after the early 1990s when capitalism went into secular decline. The decline has perhaps been most dramatically seen in the United States where the real earnings of workers are less now than they were in the 1970s. Real unemployment -- not the dubious official figure -- is over 20 percent. Some 50 million Americans are classed as poor out of a total population of 310 million. The richest 400 American individuals have more combined wealth than 150 million fellow Americans.
It is in this historical context that Western rulers are increasingly resorting to authoritarian methods of governance -- out of necessity.
Faced with ever-growing angry and deprived populations, the Western ruling class are challenged by democratic rights colliding with the system's appalling dysfunction.
It is also in this context that Western powers are seeking an escape route from the social tensions at home by pursuing militarism abroad.
British Foreign Minister Philip Hammond claimed that Western countries are "at a disadvantage" in opposing Vladimir Putin's Russia because Britain and its allies are encumbered by democratic procedure.
As the Financial Times reported: "The foreign secretary told MPs [members of parliament] on Tuesday that the UK and other Nato members were less able to react quickly to changing world events because of having to secure the assent of parliament, the media and the public."
Hammond's logic means his ruling clique wants to get rid of democracy in order to act as they see fit without democratic oversight. The secret bombing, disclosed earlier this month, of Syria by the British air force in contravention of both parliamentary prohibition and international law is a sign of where Hammond wants to take his government's power.
Perhaps even more noxious is the view of retired American General Wesley Clark, who is a major figure in the US political class. He told American news channel MSNBC that the time was ripe for the authorities to detain and lock-up anyone who is deemed to be "disloyal to America." He openly cited the mass incarceration of Japanese-Americans and German-Americans during the Second World War as a favorable precedent.
"Disloyal Americans" is a dangerously mutable notion. Any citizen who criticizes Washington's foreign militarism, oligarchic economic policy or its increasingly police state practices could be liable for detention without trial.
Ineluctably, it seems, Western powers are moving more and more to adopt authoritarian measures against their populations. Once again, as in previous times, they are flirting with fascism to shore up their deeply dysfunctional economic systems. It's a love affair that never really died.
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