The discrediting of experts and the rise of charlatans

Moisés Naím (Tripoli, 1952) is one of the most renowned global columnists and commentators. He was director of the magazine Foreign Policyas well as the author of more than a dozen books on international politics. He has just published in Spain “What is happening to us: 121 ideas to explore the 21st century”. For the title he borrowed the phrase from Ortega y Gasset: “We do not know what is happening to us and that is precisely what is happening to us.”

Question: One of the striking things you point out in your book is that, after leaving the COVID pandemic behind, we have to face another global pandemic, that of mental health. A quarter of the planet suffers from some kind of disorder. Are we facing a humanity that is increasingly mentally ill?

Answer: No, I wouldn’t say that humanity is sick. It is an anxious humanity because it has strong intuitions about profound, epochal changes. We have the feeling that great changes are approaching, such as climate change or advances in Artificial Intelligence, which will affect us all, but we don’t know when or how. And that is what produces the anxiety that all mental health studies reflect.

Q. For a society to be healthy, there must be clear rules for everyone and a fundamental principle of public morality. But one would say that these barriers of morality have begun to be broken if, for example, a significant majority of American citizens are willing to forgive and re-elect a convicted criminal like Trump. The same can be said in the case of Marine Le Pen, who is prosecuted for inciting hatred or embezzlement of European funds.

A. It is true, we live in an era with big problems and small leaders. In today’s world it is difficult to govern. Power is easy to obtain, difficult to use and easy to lose and that is why these leaders find no other way to survive and satisfy their followers than by using all kinds of tactics and tricks to stay in power. I define them as “the three Ps”: polarization, populism and post-truth. That is why any explanation for this phenomenon can be summed up in one idea: it is very difficult to be successful as a ruler.

P. That has always been the case, but when a ruler has a criminal past…

A. I have a book about this called “Illicit Crime: How Traffickers, Smugglers, and Pirates Are Changing the World” (2005). It presents organized crime as a new form of criminality. States where the government is organized crime are proliferating. Here we are no longer talking about morality, but about the survival of democratic countries.

Q. Political analysts are finding it increasingly difficult and are not always taken into account by those in power. You say in your book: “It is difficult to think ahead (…) changes are too big and too fast (…) the future is slipping away from us.” Do politicians ignore people like you or is it simply short-term thinking that dominates?

A. Of course. But this is part of another phenomenon: the discrediting of experts. There is an open fight against them, and it is a well-deserved fight. They have made many mistakes, they have not seen things that they should have foreseen. And another interesting thing: the barriers to accessing a commentator’s position are null: anyone now has the right (and sometimes uses it with enormous success and added value) to be a stowaway in this sector, to say things that are much more interesting, profound, concrete and effective than the official experts.

Q. Could you give some examples?

A. No, because there are literally thousands of them. Someone, anyone you know, can easily sit down one day full of indignation and write a column that will be read by ten million people. And this changes the relationship between experts and users of information. There is no longer a monopoly on written opinions and international debates, but anyone who has interesting things to say can do so. The problem is that there are also cheaters, liars and manipulators who invent data, who build this post-truth in which one no longer knows who to believe, or whether the data provided is true or not.

Q. Back in 2018, you wrote that this was the year of the charlatans, and that your followers were as much or more to blame for this phenomenon because they are “irresponsibly misinformed, indolent and willing to believe any proposal, no matter how far-fetched it may be.” Are we going from bad to worse and there is no remedy for this?

A. We are learning. People know the consequences of paying attention to these charlatans, but they don’t know how to handle them. I think that little by little there is a growing awareness that one must be careful with the handling of information, that one cannot believe everything that comes in, that one must not spread material that is dangerous. We have seen this with Russia and its strategic bet of using information to create instability and chaos among democratic countries.

Q. Many analysts, including you, believe that democracy is in danger. Your recipe for 2021 was “more democracy and creating a consensus about how serious this threat is”. At the same time, the results of the European elections show, for example, the increase in voters, especially young people between 18 and 25 years old, who have been seduced by far-right parties that despise democracy…

A. Behind all this there is a new reality: we have big problems with very limited leaders. And this gives a young person every right to say “don’t talk to me about democracy if democracy is what you are showing me”. Young people have other expectations. We need to rethink politics and the economy of the 21st century. We are seeing singers of rock Playing important roles for young people, entrepreneurs like Elon Musk who have millions of followers and these are answers to those problems that are not new but are now boiling over.

Q. Do fears, anxiety about major changes, and the feeling of being forgotten by elites explain the rise of the far right in Europe and around the world? Or is it the inability of the political class to act effectively and not in electoral terms? Have we forgotten once and for all such important concepts as social justice or the distribution of wealth?

A. Behind these questions lies the presumption that there is a model that does offer solutions. And that it has them or that, simply, for reasons of political economy and even corruption, it does not activate them. And, in essence, there are two connected and extremely important issues: how to manage economic inequality and the issue of migration. The economy must pay more attention to inequality and not think only in electoral terms.

Q. You explain the origin of the war as a result of a forgotten paragraph 23 of the conclusions of the NATO summit in April 2008, which opened the way to negotiations for Ukraine’s entry into the Atlantic Alliance. You add: “I am convinced that somewhere in the world a paragraph 23 of some kind is produced every day.” Could you point to one?

A. Yes, and it is in my next book that will be released in the first quarter of 2025. But, for contractual reasons, I cannot give details.

Q. Spain is pushing for the recognition of a Palestinian state as a solution to the problem. Do you think that this recognition is key?

A. In both Ukraine and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the end of the story is a negotiation that, by definition, will not please anyone. The important thing is to end the killing. But we are seeing that, for Hamas, continuing to be active, continuing the killing, is a question of survival. And the same for Netanyahu. What is obvious is that there will be a negotiation with results that will not be welcomed by either side.

Q. The fight against illegal immigration has been a major issue in the European elections. Is closing borders the only solution to respond to citizens’ fears and curb xenophobia?

A. It is a problem that will be with us, with our children and our grandchildren, all over the world. There are problems that have no solution. Someone like me who is not a politician can say that. Politicians can talk about progress, about successes. But a systemic, organized, global solution, coordinated between the countries of departure and arrival, is not going to work. It has to be done in a segmented way, with the parties involved in each region of the world.

Q. Artificial Intelligence is undoubtedly a powerful and disturbing weapon. How big is the risk that it will be used, especially by the “bad guys”?

A. One hundred percent. Like all other technologies, it is a double-edged sword. All new technologies are a blessing, because they allow for advances in many diseases and solve historical problems of humanity, and a curse, because they will make it easier for evil agents to gain power and money.