The West's victory in the Cold War was not just the product of a superior military. The real source of Western strength was its ideals and values, and their embodiment in a political and social system that valued the individual and their dignity as human beings. Democracy was the reason that the West prevailed in that titanic struggle. It is supremely ironic then that democracy has become a vulnerability as the West squares off against authoritarians in yet another great-power competition. The lesson of 2018 is that democrats around the world must rethink the basic operating procedures of their societies if they are to combat the threat to them that is generated by the very openness that they cherish.
The West believes that openness is a source of strength. Our societies are founded on the notion that open competition in the marketplace of ideas will separate truth from falsehood, fact from fiction. Only in the most extreme circumstances do we allow the government to meddle in that media sphere, fearing that legitimation of one intervention will create a slippery slope that inevitably undermines the entire system.
That core belief has been tested in the last year as evidence has mounted of campaigns by some governments to use the basic institutions of modern society to undermine democracies that they consider hostile. Only the willfully blind cannot see the political disinformation campaign that Russia waged in the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign to exploit divisions in that country and discredit its political processes and media institutions.