By Dr. Adnan Bouzan

The greatest tragedy is not that peoples are ruled by authoritarian regimes, but that they coexist with their authoritarianism, reproduce it, and gradually grant it psychological, moral, and cultural legitimacy. Tyranny does not rely solely on instruments of repression and prisons; it is sustained by an implicit acceptance—silent at times, enthusiastic at others—that makes submission appear less costly than freedom. Here, voluntary servitude emerges as the most dangerous form of domination, because it is not imposed through direct force, but planted in consciousness, nurtured in minds, and gradually transformed into a way of life.

Peoples submit to their rulers when obedience is redefined as a virtue, dissent as a threat, and freedom as chaos. Generations raised under authoritarian systems do not learn the meaning of citizenship, but the meaning of survival; they are not educated in rights, but in avoiding punishment; they are not trained for political participation, but for reading the moods of power. Over time, submission ceases to be a forced act and becomes an automatic behavior, an unspoken conviction that politics is dangerous and that safety lies in silence.

Fear, in this context, is not merely a tool of repression; it becomes an internal structure, a collective memory, even an identity. The citizen fears not only the security apparatus, but the very idea of change—the unknown, the collapse of what remains of a fragile life. Through a repetitive and systematic discourse, authority convinces people that the alternative to authoritarianism is chaos, that the fall of the ruler means the collapse of the state, and that freedom is a luxury societies deemed “not ready” cannot afford. Thus, paradoxically, the despot becomes a false guarantor of the stability he himself destroyed, and submission turns into something resembling a defensive instinct against a carefully manufactured fear.

This submission cannot be sustained without an ideology that justifies it and provides it with moral cover. Nationalism is used to transform the ruler into a symbol of the nation; religion is instrumentalized to sanctify power; and the rhetoric of sovereignty and conspiracy is deployed to criminalize any critical voice. In such a climate, authoritarianism is not debated as a structural political problem, but defended as a national choice or a moral duty. The oppressed thus defend their oppression, justify corruption with the pretext of a “sensitive phase,” and demonize the victim for demanding the right to a dignified life.

Poverty, in turn, is not an incidental outcome of authoritarianism, but one of its most effective tools. When a person is pushed to the edge of survival, they become preoccupied with securing their daily bread rather than changing their reality. Economic need is managed as a means of social control: a job in exchange for loyalty, assistance in exchange for silence, superficial stability in exchange for relinquishing dignity. Over time, politics is emptied of its substance, and the state is reduced to a giant employer wielding the power to grant and withhold.

More dangerous still is that servitude does not remain confined to the relationship between the people and the ruler; it seeps into the very fabric of society. Authoritarian culture is reproduced within the family, the school, the party, the institution, and even in the discourse of certain intellectuals who justify repression in the name of political realism or fear of something worse. At this point, authoritarianism is no longer merely a system of governance, but a pervasive mentality, making its transformation an extremely complex task, because the problem no longer resides solely in the palace, but in minds accustomed to obedience.

This is why attempts at change fail when they limit themselves to toppling individuals without dismantling the mental structures that produced them. Revolutions that do not confront the culture of submission quickly reproduce authoritarianism under new names and different faces. Liberation that does not begin with consciousness often ends in disappointment, or in an even harsher form of tyranny.

Freedom, in this sense, is not a fleeting political event, but a long and painful process that begins when peoples acknowledge that tyrants do not survive by force alone, but through the obedience granted to them, the fear that is cultivated, and the silence that is presented as wisdom. When this unwritten contract between ruler and ruled is broken, the first steps toward emancipation begin—not merely by overthrowing the despot, but by liberating the human being from servitude itself.

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