There is a knock at the door. Local authorities have received a tip that you have broken the moral code – a new set of laws banning your once-accepted lifestyle. You will be called for questioning and it is unclear when you will return home.
In an authoritarian state, neighborhood trust is a thing of the past. Citizens are often encouraged to report suspected wrongdoing in their community to the government. There are countless examples of this throughout history – and around the world today. It’s happening in Russia, and there’s even an app for it in Saudi Arabia.
In the United States, we seem to be sneaking into this culture of community surveillance. Texas’ SB 8 put ordinary Americans to charge anyone who has had or assisted in an abortion. Texans report the parents of transgender children to the authorities. Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin set up a tip line and encouraged parents to report teachers teaching “division” topics. Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” Act Encourages Parents to Control Teachers. With the Republican Party increasingly embracing authoritarianism, this is probably just the beginning.
Tom Ginsburg, a professor of international law at the University of Chicago, says these kinds of policies are an American version of what you might see in authoritarian states.
“It encourages private enforcement of moral standards,” Ginsburg says. “That is very corrosive. It is a process that undermines society’s ability to function in the traditional ways that societies do.”
Ginsburg says he’s concerned we’re losing democracy in states where Republican candidates for office seem willing to undermine future elections, meaning citizens’ ability to reject authoritarian leaders could be diminished. He also says he doesn’t think our conservative Supreme Court has an interest in helping prevent democratic backlash.
“The Supreme Court can facilitate the undermining of democracy from below through the general stance of, ‘Well, that’s not our problem,’” Ginsburg said.
Consuelo Amat, an assistant professor of political science at John Hopkins University, says that when a state becomes authoritarian, anything people in your community learned about you during Democratic years could be used against you once the new regime takes power. . She has studied Chile under dictator Augusto Pinochet closely and says that’s what happened there. Amat says those who support the new regime could essentially become informers for it.
“If that starts to happen, the dynamics for communities and neighborhoods will be extremely bad,” Amat says. “The distrust people have is huge, so people don’t start sharing information at all. One of the cores of democracy is neighborhood trust. You have to trust others in your society and in your community for democracy to work. Period of time. When there is a very high level of mistrust, you see a rift in the community.”
As the US moves further toward authoritarianism, you can imagine states enacting more laws to disempower, criminalize, or otherwise marginalize certain groups. Anyone you regularly encounter who disagrees politically may be encouraged to report violations of these laws as a kind of civic duty. They will have more ways to do this than ever before as modern technology allows us to monitor people’s social media feeds, view them through Ring cameras, report them through community watch apps like Citizen. and more.
