How It Works, and Why

George Friedman writes international wisdom at Geopolitical Futures, and is often prescient. Here RealClearWorld reprints an analysis he has done of Brexit, Trump, and the rise of the AfD in Germany.

In all three cases, a governing elite lost track of what people were thinking, how they were suffering, and got battered as a consequence.

These are times of systemic failure. (snip) It becomes apparent that something is wrong with the governing principles, the dominant parties, the leading individuals and so on.
But while this is becoming visible outside of the establishment parties, the establishment is oblivious that they are failing.

As the public becomes more alarmed and frustrated at the inability of the establishment parties to grasp that there is something terribly wrong, two things happen. First, the voters are blamed for their immaturity and there is increasing alarm that the irresponsibility of the public will disrupt the management of the system. Second, leaders arise who share or (in the case of politicians) exploit the increasing fear.

The mainstream parties invent the idea that it is these new politicians, inappropriate by tenor and character of governing, who are creating a crisis. This is important: the perception is that the new politicians are creating the crisis, not the other way around.

And that leads to Friedman's generalization about how this process works.

In a democracy, when politicians are oblivious to what is happening around them and a massive social crisis is well under way, the consequences are utterly predictable. First, the public knows full well there is a serious problem. Second, they know the establishment doesn’t care. Third, they know the political system is the only recourse. And finally, personalities arise to lead them against the establishment.

The establishment looks at these new leaders as bizarre and doomed to fail. These leaders, unlike the establishment, are aware of the social crisis and the contempt the establishment is held in. They do everything they can to appear utterly different than establishment politicians. The establishment believes this will lead to the downfall of the new politicians. They are totally unaware of how offensive their mode of government and even mode of speech has become.

I would almost be willing to take a Poly. Sci. class from George Friedman.