The Politics of Fear
You may not know what all of them are about, but you’ve heard about the huge number of executive orders (EOs) that President Trump has signed. They differ a lot- some are unrealistic, some have already been blocked by lawsuits, and some could do a lot of harm. But many of the EOs have one thing in common: they can create stress and fear among those who are vulnerable in one way or another.
Frantz Fanon, a noted African political philosopher writing on colonial and developing country governments in 1961, wrote: “this party which used to call itself the servant of the people, which used to claim that it worked for the full expression of the people’s will, as soon as the colonial power puts the country into its control hastens to send the people back to their caves.”
Fanon is describing a government that falsely claims the moral and electoral authority to enact its agenda, regardless of whether the public approves. Compliance- and lack of dissent- is ensured through silencing the “free flow of ideas” and through more overt, physically violent actions taken by policing institutions.
Why bring up Fanon, who died before the wins of the US Civil Rights movement? Because even though he was writing about colonialism and African despots, there are prophetic echoes through the decades to today’s national politics.
On his first day, 26 EOs were signed and more have continued to be issued. The EOs are maybe best understood not as individual causes to panic, but when taken together they can intimidate and overwhelm. The reality is that the President is only one part of the US government and many of the EO cannot be enacted solely.
Despite the frailties that have been exposed in the American government over the past decade or so, the founders did not give to one branch the kind of power the president thru the executive branch is attempting to exercise. Many of the EOs will need congressional action to take effect and others will have to go through the court. Only time will tell which orders will be enacted, which will be blocked, and how the nation’s democracy will survive.
