PARIS (AP) – As the world watched American institutions shaken by an angry mob, officials and ordinary citizens were asking themselves: how fragile is democracy and how much stress could their own political systems endure?
“If this can happen in the US, it can happen anywhere,” said Gunjan Chhibber, 39, who works for an American technology company in India, the world’s largest democracy. She stayed up all night, watching and worrying at her home in Delhi as chaos unfolded in many time zones.
In Germany, whose modern governance system has been nurtured by successive American administrations, Chancellor Angela Merkel was extraordinarily blunt on Thursday, drawing a direct line from President Donald Trump’s refusal to concede his electoral defeat to the atmosphere that made the capture of the Capitol of the USA by its possible supporters.
“A fundamental rule of democracy is that, after elections, there are winners and losers. Both have to play their role with decency and responsibility if democracy itself is to win, ”said Merkel.
Eva Sakschewska, a German who followed the news closely, said the events in Washington were almost inconceivable.
“You can only fear how far it can go when populists come to power and do these things,” she said. “You know that in the United States democracy has a long history and that it is something like that – yes, one is afraid.”
Even the United Nations offered the kind of declaration generally reserved for fragile democracies, expressing sadness and asking unidentified political leaders to promote respect for “democratic processes and the rule of law”.
In Iraq, where Saddam Hussein’s violent overthrow by the United States in 2003 led to years of sectarian conflict and a deeply flawed democracy, many watched and marveled at the scenes taking place in Congress.
Iraqis have been suffering for years under power-sharing agreements between rival elites divided along sectarian lines. Behind the scenes agreements are common to avoid political paralysis, and democratic ideals have been tainted by an entrenched system of clientelism, whereby public jobs are distributed in exchange for support. Political parties also have affiliated militias that exercise significant power on the streets. By far, the violence in Washington had a negligible familiarity.
“Iraq is asking the US regime to respect the principles of democracy or to intervene militarily to overthrow the dictator,” Mustafa Habib, a well-known Iraqi analyst and researcher, said in a tweet that mocked Washington’s actions abroad.
Venezuela, which is under US sanctions, said the events show that the US “is suffering from what it has generated in other countries with its policy of aggression”.
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has survived the efforts of the US-backed opposition to oust him, despite accusations of human rights abuses, civil unrest and a humanitarian crisis that has forced millions to flee the oil-rich country.
“We export so much democracy that we don’t have any more,” wrote American-Palestinian scholar Yousef Monayyer on Twitter, Trump’s favorite social network until he was deleted from it on Wednesday.
His comment was added to the growing tension of sarcasm that bordered on the schadenfreude of those who have long resented the perception of the American tendency to punish other countries for less than perfect adherence to democratic ideals.
This time, however, it was an attempt by the Americans to prevent a peaceful transition of power to President-elect Joe Biden, after a democratic election in a country that many around the world considered a model of democratic governance.
In China, which has had constant friction with Washington over trade, as well as military and political issues, people have been blunt in their criticism of Trump and his supporters, citing both the coronavirus pandemic and the action of the crowd.
Communist government China has long accused the United States of hypocrisy in its efforts to promote democracy and defend human rights abroad.
The Communist Youth League published a photomontage of violence on Capitol Hill on its Weibo microblog, similar to Twitter, with the caption: “On the sixth, the United States Congress, a very beautiful site to see. This seemed to scoff at Mayor Nancy Pelosi for her June 2019 comments in praise of the sometimes violent protests against the government in Hong Kong.
“The US is not as safe as China, right? I think Trump is a hypocritical and selfish person, ”said financial advisor Yang Ming.
Iran, which faces routine criticism from the United States for violations of human rights and democratic values, has jumped into chaos as evidence of American hypocrisy.
The semi-official Fars news agency called the United States “fragmented democracy”, while Iran’s pro-government Twitter accounts rejoiced, circulating pictures of the mobs with hashtags that included #DownfalloftheUS.
Events have tarnished the American insistence that it is a bastion of democracy for countries that only in recent decades, in some cases, have given up on autocratic or military-controlled forms of government.
“The beauty of democracy?” with a shrug emoji was the reaction tweeted by Bashir Ahmad, a personal assistant to the President of Nigeria, who has suffered several blows since independence – including one led decades ago by President Muhammadu Buhari, who was elected in 2015.
Some legislatures in Asia – South Korea and Taiwan, for example – have sometimes been marked by fights and screams, but the democracies in the region are usually sober versions of European and American legislative models.
“This is shocking. I hope this serves as a chance for Americans to review their democracy, ”said Na HyunPil at the Korean House for International Solidarity, an NGO based in Seoul. “Trump is entirely responsible for this incident. After his four-year rule, Americans have a hard time telling other countries that their country is a good model of democracy. ”
Several countries, both US allies and antagonists, have issued travel warnings to their citizens, although with coronavirus infections increasing in the United States, arrivals from abroad are reduced to a trickle.
Ally after ally expressed shock, followed by claims that US democratic institutions would withstand the turmoil.
“All my life, America has represented some very important things: an idea of freedom and an idea of democracy,” said British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. “To the extent that he encouraged people to invade the Capitol, and to the extent that the president has consistently cast doubt on the outcome of a free and fair election, I believe he was completely wrong.”
For others, less friendly, it was portrayed as a last breath and that belonged only to the Americans themselves.
“American democracy is obviously limping on both feet,” said Konstantin Kosachev, head of the foreign affairs committee of the upper house of Russia’s parliament. “I say this without a hint of rejoicing. America no longer traces a course and, therefore, has lost all rights to define it – and even more to impose it on others. “
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Associated Press journalists from around the world contributed.