{"id":73097,"date":"2019-11-14T12:08:18","date_gmt":"2019-11-14T03:08:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/?p=73097"},"modified":"2021-10-25T15:14:45","modified_gmt":"2021-10-25T06:14:45","slug":"history-has-no-end-and-democracy-will-always-be-threatened-says-latvias-president-egils-levits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/news\/73097","title":{"rendered":"\u201cHistory has no end and democracy will always be threatened,\u201d says Latvia’s President Levits"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cDemocracy is not helpless,\u201d said Latvia’s President Egils Levits<\/a>. On October 23rd, the president visited Waseda University to deliver a talk on \u201cLatvia\u2019s perspective on challenges in modern democracies.\u201d A European judge at the European Court of Justice since 2004, he emphasized the importance of a \u201cself-defensive\u201d democracy\u2014one that can protect itself from destruction by means of guaranteed freedoms\u2014 and use legal universal frameworks.<\/p>\n

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A packed house in Okuma Tower welcomed President Levits, First Lady Andra Levite<\/a> and other personnel from the Embassy of Latvia in Japan<\/a>. After an introduction by Waseda\u2019s International Office<\/a> and the MC for the event, President Levits gave a speech about different aspects of democracy: consumerism, populism and big data as threats to democracy; the importance of civic duty in upholding it; and legal frameworks to keep it intact.<\/p>\n

The president has a distinguished career in law and political science. He wrote the Preamble or Introduction to the Constitution adopted in 2014 and has won numerous awards for his service\u2014 many of which commended him for jurisprudence. In 2016, he won the Letter of Recognition by the Cabinet of Ministers on outstanding contribution to the development of jurisprudence and legislation, and in 2018 an award by the Cabinet of Ministers \u201cfor significant contribution to the development of the Latvian judicial system, the strengthening of democracy and the rule of law, and scientific achievements in justice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since the president assumed his role in July 2019, he has advocated for multilateral cooperation to protect democracy and ensure global peace and security.<\/a> \u201cThe United Nations is and must remain the central forum for multilateralism and a rules-based global order,\u201d said President Levits at the lecture, who had also emphasized it at the 74th United Nations General Assembly.<\/p>\n

In his speech, he praised democracy as the most high-functioning\u2014albeit flawed\u2014system the world has today. \u201cDemocracy is far from perfect, but it is the highest political achievement of mankind,\u201d he said. \u201cModern democracies have gone through constant improvements and upgrades\u2026we have seen constitutional democracies reach higher levels of prosperity and growth than undemocratic states.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, President Levits, who was an active and strong advocate for the restoration of independence of Latvia from 1989 to 1991, is also keenly aware of democracy\u2019s fragility. \u201cClassic theories of democracy are based on an assumption that citizens are capable of thinking critically and making rational decisions,\u201d he said. He admitted that in modern times, civic duty has given way to self-interests. The manipulation of technology and overwhelming developments in information and communication technologies have made critical thinking challenging, he said. While he championed freedom that aligns with democratic principles, he warned that untethered freedom could hurt democratic ideals: \u201cPeople often tend to take democracy and its advantages for granted, as a permanent fixture we all benefit from.\u201d<\/p>\n

Globally, the president believes that Latvia can foster relations to advance universal values. He has previously served as Latvian ambassador to Germany, Austria, Hungary, and Switzerland, as well as deputy prime minister, minister of justice and member of parliament. He said although Latvia is a small country, it is still an EU member state and would use its platform to cooperate with different countries. As for Japan, he said he would work with its government to address issues such as climate change.<\/p>\n

The president of Latvia emphasized the importance of preserving democracy through principles. A lawyer and political scientist, he stressed the importance of using legal frameworks and multilateral cooperation to protect democracy. His speech was as pragmatic as it was hopeful, highlighting the threats to democracy but also acknowledging how civic duty could enhance it, depending on how one uses freedom. \u201cDemocracy is the only form of government that learns from its mistakes and constantly improves itself,\u201d said President Levits.<\/p>\n

*This article was written and contributed by the following student.<\/em><\/p>\n

Student Contributor<\/strong>
\nMarina Yoshimura (4th Year Student)
\nSchool of International Liberal Studies<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cDemocracy is not helpless,\u201d said Latvia’s President Egils Levits. On October 23rd, the president visite […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":73096,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[81,117],"tags":[370,366,214],"class_list":["post-73097","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-topic","tag-contributor-en","tag-guest-en","tag-intl-office-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73097","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73097"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73097\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":74996,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73097\/revisions\/74996"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/top\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}