Commissioned Book Review: Jan Zielonka, Counter-Revolution: Liberal Europe in Retreat
| DOI | 10.1177/1478929921991724 |
| Author | Magdalena Lorenc |
| Date | 01 May 2022 |
| Published date | 01 May 2022 |
| Subject Matter | Commissioned Book Review |
Political Studies Review
2022, Vol. 20(2) NP5 –NP6
journals.sagepub.com/home/psrev
Commissioned Book Review
991724PSW0010.1177/1478929921991724Political Studies ReviewCommissioned Book Review
book-review2021
Commissioned Book Review
Counter-Revolution: Liberal Europe in
Retreat by Jan Zielonka. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2018. xii + 164 pp. (176 pp.),
£14.99, ISBN: 9780198806561.
Jan Zielonka’s book is in the form of a letter to
‘his mentor’ (p. IX) Ralf Dahrendorf (who died
in 2009) and is a reference to . . .A Letter
Intended to Have Been Sent to a Gentleman in
Warsaw by the German sociologist from 1990.
As a liberal, Zielonka is concerned about the
condition and future of liberal democracy in
the face of growing anti-liberal tendencies.
The aim of the book, as declared by
Zielonka, is to fill the niche created as a result
of the lack of self-reflection and self-criticism
on the part of liberals as important causes of
the present crisis of liberal democracy in
Europe. This is a broader problem resulting,
according to the author, from the confusion of
European – no longer liberals, but neoliberals
– in the situation of the collapse of the common
consensus in the 1990s that liberal democracy
is the culmination of the development of
democracy – “the end of history”. He addresses
his book to those who are interested in the
reform of liberal democracy – to conscious
citizens and the future political and financial
elites. Why not to the present? According to
Zielonka, there are no more “real” liberals
among European leaders. Liberal democracy,
according to Zielonka, therefore needs new
politicians. Their selection is not a current
issue, as it concerns a perspective of 15 years
during which we will be “climbing the »valley
of tears«“ (a term borrowed by Zielonka from
Dahrendorf, p. 128). During that time, it will
be necessary to develop a new theory of liber-
alism, even if it will be utopian.
When writing about Europe, Zielonka
means the Euroapean Union, that is, its 28 (27
now) Member States, which, despite differ-
ences, decided to integrate. Apart from eco-
nomic considerations, the foundation of this
project was the assumption that there was no
alternative to liberal democracy as the only
rational system. The global economic crisis in
the financial and banking markets of 2008
challenged that hypothesis. Liberal democracy
did not create mechanisms that would protect
cities and states from bankruptcy. Wherever
possible, the rescue of the financial sector was
financed with public money. At the same time,
no consequences have been drawn towards
those responsible for the crisis. That meant
‘socialism for the rich and capitalism for the
poor’ (p. 56). The loss of economic security
has been compounded by the terrorist threat, in
part due to the policies of the US and some EU
countries in the Middle East. 2015 brought
another crisis, this time a migration crisis, as a
result of which the countries of the south of the
continent had to deal with thousands of refu-
gees from Syria and Iraq as well as economic
emigrants from Africa, who reached the shores
of Italy and Greece every day, then tried to get
to Britain or Germany. Failures of attempts to
regulate the refugee crisis weakened the
authority of Community institutions. All those
events meant that some of the citizens of the
EU Member States lost their sense of security
and began to treat liberal politicians as ‘incom-
petent chumps’ (p. 97). Zielonka’s book tells
about that, using that language.
The main value of the book is therefore the
presentation in an accessible and synthetic way
of the greatest European crises of the past years.
This constitutes the strength of the book, which
is addressed to a broad audience with a liberal
sensitivity. However, it would be appropriate to
discuss the arguments concerning the conse-
quences of crises in the EU, which Zielonka
tries to link directly with the rise of populism,
which in turn he describes as the title ‘counter-
revolution’. This seems to be an oversimplifica-
tion and the use of the term ‘counter-revolution’
an abuse. Although he tries to avoid only a
pejorative depiction of ‘counter-revolutionar-
ies’, he defines them as ‘Barbarians at the gate’
(title of chapter 6), and he sketches the relation-
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