Analysis. The use of political deceit

Telling the truth does not seem to be a priority for the new U.S. president. Since Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th president of the U.S. his speeches have been plagued of factual inaccuracies or plain falsehoods ranging from his hyperbolic appraisal of the presidential elections, his own popularity and the alleged success of his political events to the (non-existent) emergency caused by Swedish immigrants, as well as the U.S. citizens fear of travelling to Paris (despite the surge of U.S. citizens to the French city in 2016).

The flamboyant new president has appointed himself with the gift of honesty and of being the only politician who has fulfilled his campaign promises, as well as to accomplish many things in so little time, a feat nobody has completed so far.

Why does Donald trump lie?

The history of lies in politics runs deep. In early times, Plato justified “The Noble Lie” when a ruler often claims some falsehood for the well-being of his people. For instance, the noble lie is justified by the yearly trip of the Three Wise Men every January, so that children can receive magical gifts every time. This is the type of lie based on paternalism, where citizens are considered uninformed infants willing to receive goods from their rulers.

During the Renaissance, the lie was justified as “the ruler’s need” to survive the political world. This is how Machiavelli claimed that “Men are sosimple, and so subject to present necessities, that he who seeks to deceive will always find someone who will allow himself to be deceived.” in his work The Prince (chap. XVIII), thus resulting in the stark justification of lying for the sake of the powerful which established a split between ethics and politics and turned Machiavelli in the accursed and realistic author defined by the phrase, which he actually never coined, “The end justifies the means.”

However, Donald Trump does not lie to save himself nor to protect anybody. His last press conference focused on the behavior of the press and the media in a clear demonstration of a well-considered strategy far from being an improvised tantrum.

What’s in it for the businessmen and president in his erratic claim of factual inaccuracies?

Firstly, to desensitize society. Just think how former president Clinton faced impeachment for lying under oath about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky, while Donald Trump not only lies, but constantly exposes his falsehoods by claiming that the media lies, without having any type of political consequences whatsoever.

Secondly, Trump claims are mainly addressed to his followers, who remain faithful to his leader and who will ultimately be enemies to the independent media.

The Republican president accuses the press of being dishonest and even of being “an enemy to the American people”, resulting in the prestigious New York Times or largest global network CNN being excluded from White House press conferences.

Exercising lies and an attack to those responsible of informing the public are two sides of the same coin, disclosing a more subversive and radical stand: the relativity of truth. An attempt of showing that there is no such thing as truth and that all press statements respond to corporate interests aims to reinforce the idea that the political system is corrupted.

Thus, thirdly, Trump’s most important reason to lies is to change the political order. Lying for the dystopian president is an act of disloyalty with the liberal democracy of the masses. Stemming from cynicism, Trump criticizes the entire political regime and thus vindicates his right to change it, or like senior White House adviser Steve Bannon has put it, in a clear allusion to the worst authoritarian European lessons, “to dismantle the system”.

To put the idea of an independent truth on the table is to open the path to the legitimation of the use of lying for the powerful and thus provide justification for unscrupulous actions that leave authoritarianism around the corner.

During the 20th century, lying in politics produced ghastly totalitarian nightmares. Sufficient to mention George Orwell’s famous dystopian novel about total political control, Nineteen Eighty-Four, to demonstrate the dark fruits of power taking over truth. After harrowing vicissitudes, the main character of the novel, Winston Smith, is inflicted with torture by totalitarian O’Brian in an apparently trivial examination, where he is asked “How much is two plus two?” to which Winston answers, “four”; torture continues until an exhausted Winston asserts "Sometimes they are five. Sometimes they are three. Sometimes they are all of them at once." O’Brian’s lesson is dismal as it is not ruled by the laws of science but to the will of power. For Winston, "Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two makes four.”

Will lying in politics be the dart that lurks from within the U.S. democracy in the 21st century?

Trump needs to increase the national cohesion and a major national popular support to “dismantle the system”, a difficult, yet not impossible, challenge. This could be attempted ressorting to the the classic resource to instill fear in the population by creating an external threat that justifies a declaration of war.How strong are the U.S. institutions to resist the attacks of their 45th president? Or rather, how much will Trump be able to subvert democracy in the U.S.?

Though naïve as these questions may seem, in the context of one of the first modern democracies, where national identity and democratic ideology blend like nowhere else, we must bear in mind that novelties do exist in politics and that history is full of unforeseen events. Reality exists regardless of any background.

Dr. Juan Russo holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Florence, Italy. He has been a visiting professor in several European, Latin American and U.S. universities and has published many books on compared politics and democratization, namely, Models for democratizationand Political democratization and competition.  He currently teaches at the University of Guanajuato in Mexico.

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