Rhetoric as an Ontological Condition of Democracy

Democracy as a Space of Rhetorical Freedom

It is no accident that democracy was born in the ancient Greek polis. It emerged as a political form capable of sustaining a multiplicity of voices — yet only for those who were physically free. This paradoxical limitation of Athenian democracy points to a fundamental truth: physical freedom precedes rational freedom. Only a person liberated from bondage can develop multidimensional thinking, embrace worldview autonomy, and ultimately exercise considered judgement for the benefit of the community.

Democratic governance correlates directly with the flourishing of intellectual freedom and the capacity to perceive the world from multiple vantage points. It is precisely for this reason that democratic societies tend to be more advanced in scientific and cultural terms — they cultivate what might be called epistemological multiplicity. Consider the Scandinavian nations — Norway, Sweden, Denmark — whose long-standing democratic traditions are accompanied by consistently high indices of innovation, education, and social development. Authoritarian regimes, by contrast, systematically suppress scientific and cultural freedom, producing stagnation as their inevitable consequence.

Rhetoric: Both Consequence and Cause of Freedom

In a democratic society, individuals do not merely think broadly, but also begin to articulate their thoughts in public. Rhetoric emerges as the natural outgrowth of a free society. Yet this is not a one-directional process.

A highly developed rhetorical sensibility in certain individuals can bring down autocracies and dictatorial regimes. A gifted orator in a closed society may, through the sheer force of speech, persuade a crowd to overthrow tyranny. History offers vivid testimony: Martin Luther King Jr., through speeches such as "I Have a Dream", lent moral legitimacy to the struggle for civil rights in the United States; Václav Havel, in Czechoslovakia, used the measured language of a dissident intellectual to erode the foundations of communist rule; Nelson Mandela rhetorically dismantled the edifice of apartheid in South Africa. Rhetoric, in this sense, functions as a safeguard — an instrument for defending democracy against the perennial temptations of authoritarianism.

Two Paths: Evolution and Revolution

There are two distinct logics by which rhetoric and democracy typically develop in tandem:

• The evolutionary path: democracy → free thinking → mature rhetoric → the defence of democracy
• The revolutionary path: a gifted orator in a closed society → the persuasion of the masses → the overthrow of dictatorship

The first path presupposes the systematic cultivation of rhetorical abilities in successive generations. Through the enrichment of vocabulary, the study of rhetorical history, an engagement with the world's cultures, and the development of critical thinking, we construct a preventive architecture — a form of societal immunity against authoritarianism. Modern Germany, having passed through the trauma of Nazism, consciously cultivates critical thinking and a culture of debate as part of its national project of Vergangenheitsbewältigung — the working-through of the past. Rhetorical practice, in this context, builds bridges between cultures on the basis of mutual respect for values and traditions.

The Ambivalence of the Rhetorical Gift

Yet here lies a profound paradox: a leader endowed with powerful rhetorical gifts may as readily liberate a society from tyranny as enslave a free people. Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini both possessed formidable rhetorical talent, which they deployed to manipulate the masses and establish totalitarian regimes. Rhetoric is ethically neutral — it amplifies only the intention of the one who wields it.

Hannah Arendt, in her reflections on totalitarianism, demonstrated that the degradation of the public sphere and the destruction of the possibility of free dialogue invariably precede political subjugation. When rhetoric is reduced to a monologue of power, democracy dies. The defence of a plurality of voices is therefore not merely a liberal value but an existential necessity.

This leads to the central task: to build a sustained system for the cultivation of rhetorical skills, grounded in the principles of freedom, respect for others, and the acceptance of difference. Only such a rhetorical culture can serve as a genuine bulwark against future wars.

Why Is It So Difficult to Debate Values?

Value-based discussions are among the most demanding of all forms of discourse. Why? The answer lies deep within our anthropological history.

Democracy presupposes a pluralistic way of life, yet our roots lie in a far more primitive stage of human development. We once gathered in tribes around shared values, shared beliefs, shared cultural foundations. In those primordial communities, there was no tradition of internal dialogue on matters of value — values were given, axiomatic, the very bedrock of tribal identity.

It was only with the advent of democracy that pluralism began to develop as a system in which a multiplicity of values becomes not a threat but a foundation of society. Debate began to extend beyond external questions — how to trade, how to wage war — and turned inward: how to live, what to believe, what constitutes the good.

Socrates paid for that extension with his life.

But we live in a different age. Questions of value must be open to discussion. A democratic society must actively cultivate this process and protect those who dare to raise such questions, for in doing so they advance the progress of civilisation.

Why Did Rhetoric Flourish in Educational Institutions?

This brings us to a revealing question: why did rhetoric develop with particular intensity within educational institutions, especially during the modern era?

The academic sphere does not merely tolerate the opposing viewpoint — it obliges its members to articulate it, precisely to arrive at truth. When a question touches on the laws of nature, the scholarly world demands dialogue, the testing of hypotheses, the clash of arguments.

It is for this reason that the great debates of intellectual history unfolded in academic settings. Recall Thomas Henry Huxley, Darwin's most ardent defender, who entered into his celebrated confrontation with Bishop Wilberforce; or Robert Ingersoll, the American freethinker-orator who championed rationalism against religious dogmatism.

The university became the space in which rhetoric could develop as an instrument for the pursuit of truth — not through the suppression of one's opponent, but through the quality of argumentation. This is a fundamentally different model from the tribal or authoritarian one, in which a dissenting view is perceived as an existential threat.

Rhetoric as the Defence of Freedom

Rhetoric does not merely accompany democracy — it is democracy's ontological condition. Without the capacity to argue, to persuade, to sustain dialogue, democracy is inconceivable. And conversely: without democracy, rhetoric degenerates into propaganda.

The cultivation of a rhetorical culture is therefore not only an academic undertaking but a political project — one committed to the preservation of human freedom. The ability to debate questions of value without recourse to violence or ostracism is a civilisational achievement that demands constant nurturing and vigilant protection.

We still carry within us the instincts of the tribe. But rhetoric offers us the means to transcend them — not by denying our emotions, but by transforming them, through dialogue, into reasoned arguments.