A blueprint for democracy to defend itself against fascism from 1937 – more important now than ever…

In 1937, Karl Loewenstein, a German Lawyer published an essay in the American Political Science Review that can only be described as a blueprint for democracy to defend itself against fascism. You probably never heard of the essay entitled “Militant Democracy and Fundamental rights” and despite having a (highschool) degree in history, neither have I. And my topic of my final paper was the mistakes of Hindenburg that led to the rise of Hitler… Interestingly this paper was never translated into German. As we live in times that worry me, I thought it would be a good idea to convert the essay to markdown/HTML and translate it. Give it a read, it is scarily modern and describes current happenings in worrying detail. The only difference is that with social media and AI, those who are against freedom, democracy and openness to the world have far better weapons than the Nazis had in the 1920s. You can read the full essay and its follow up or stick with the summary. Here is a short gist of the…