The Darker Side of Democracy. The Worst Elected Leaders in History

Over here in the United States, we’re pretty fond of democratic forms of government -- and with good reason, since our own democracy has done pretty well for itself over the last couple hundred years. Still, there’s no denying that history has offered up a few truly terrible democratically-elected leaders. Here’s some of them:

Silvio Berlusconi
“Il Cavaliere” is probably the most harmless on this list, as he hasn’t pursued the sort of disastrous, or downright evil, decisions that other leaders have. Nonetheless, Italy wasn’t putting its best foot forward when it made Berlusconi its longest-serving leader since Mussolini. One could argue (we’re not going to, but, still, one could) that Berlusconi provided strong leadership for Italy during a particularly tumultuous time. Even if you believe that, though, it’s hard to argue for a guy who was less in the news for his policies than for bribing public officials, using legislative power for the benefit of his personal fortune, and -- yeah, you knew where we were going -- soliciting underage prostitutes.

James Buchanan
In a list about the worst democratically-elected leaders, we would be remiss if we didn’t included at least one American, and what American could we possibly go to before James Buchanan? For a more comprehensive account of his ineptitude, we direct you to our article on the worst Presidents; for right now, all you need to know is that he watched the Southern states secede and his only reaction was to wonder if he should have gotten married instead of staying a bachelor. There has been no worse American President.

Vladimir Putin
Russia may be a democracy these days, but they sure don’t look like it. Since the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, Russia has had exactly three Presidents. One of these was Boris Yeltsin, who served from 1991 until he retired in 1999. He was succeeded by Putin, who promptly ran the country for eight years, took a constitutionally-imposed break to serve as Prime Minister (Dmitry Medvedev took over as President), and then announced that he would return to run for President again -- winning the election with an incredible 64% of the vote. So, while Putin hasn’t exactly been bad for Russia, he’s been horrible for the notion of Russia as a democracy.

Adolf Hitler
Of course, who could we choose to round out the list but the commonly acknowledged most evil man in world history? It’s hard to believe that someone like Hitler, who devoted immense time and resources -- in the middle of a war, no less -- to figuring out how to kill segments of his own population, could have been popularly elected. And, in fact, he wasn’t -- but he did come to power legally in a democratic system. There were too many parties in 1930s Germany for any one to gain a majority of the vote, but in 1935, he came in second place in the election with 35% of the vote, leading to his appointment as Chancellor -- essentially, the Prime Minister. Once in that position, Hitler began to consolidate the power of the Nazi party and to remove the ability of other elements to oppose him, using apparently democratic methods to subvert democracy. And, well, we all know what happened next.

[Top pic via Flickr - U.S. Department of Agriculture. All other pics via Wikimedia Commons. Buchanan - Mathew Brady. Putin - World Economic Forum. Silvio Berlusconi - Ricardo Stuckert/PR. ]