Most if not all countries place some limitations on freedom of expression / speech. I’ve done some searches on the web and it appears that in most democratic countries, these limitations come down to one or more of the following:
Restrictions on “lying with intent to damage” (shouting “fire!”, libel, slander, scamming etc.)
Restrictions on “hate speech” - racism, incitement to violence etc.
Restrictions on blasphemy.
Limitations on broadcasts, commercials, pornography etc.
No insulting the head of state / king.
National security restrictions.
There are probably more, but in case, I was wondering; are there democracies that directly forbid “anti-democratic” speech or political parties?
To be clear; I do not mean prohibitions on groups that want to overthrow the government by force (I would assume that would fall under national security and/or incitement to violence), but on persons / parties that want to, say, institute an absolute monarch or total anarchy once they get “in power” by whatever democratic majority is needed to push that kind of drastic change through?
I’ve never heard of any such restrictions. Most Democratic countries have the requirement for democratic elections written into their charter or constitution, so it wouldn’t be possible to democratically eliminate democracy. Some democratic countries have certainly outlawed particular parties, but I’ve never heard of a blanket prohibition on parties opposed to democracy.
Well… Here in the Netherlands, you’d need a 2/3 majority to change the constitution, so I assumed it would be technically possible to eliminate democracy. Hence the question.
German legislation, as has already been said, pretty much restricts anti-democratic speech. There’s also the option of banning unconstitutional parties, although this is not based on Article 18 of the constitution (the Basic Law), as MEBuckner said. Article 18 provides that individuals can forfeit basic rights, and has never been applied. Banning parties can be done based on Article 21, regulating political parties and their privileges compared to other associations:
According to federal law, only the Federal Parliament (Bundestag), the Federal Council (Bundesrat, second chamber of German legislature) or the Federal Government can petition to the Constitutional Court for banning a party. It has been applied twice, in the 1950s: To ban a neo-Nazi party called SRP, and to ban the German Communist Party. There has been a petititon to ban the neo-Nazi NPD party a few years ago, but this failed because of grave procedural problems (it was revealed that the domestic security agencies had actually infiltrated the higher echelons of the NPD with their agents).
The general principle is referred to as “wehrhafte Demokratie” (“fortfied democracy”) in German constitutional law: Because of the experience made during the Weimar Republic of 1919-1933, Germany’s first democracy that was finally ended when Hitler seized power, it was decided that democracy cannot allow its enemies to misuse democratic freedoms in their fight against the system again.
I had always assumed that only nazi-type/racist parties were actually forbidden in Germany. I knew about some of the anti-nazi propaganda laws in Germany, but this is new to me.
If anyone has some information about these kinds of laws in the Netherlands, I’d appreciate that information.
After some re-reading, it appears that your bolding of the 1918 act only applies during war-time and the 1798 act only applies to defamation of the goverment, houses of congress and the president but not the system of government. (And some other unlawfull actions / incitements). As far as I can see, neither would really apply, except that the US has been at war quite recently, and maybe still is (it’s not like the situation in Iraq is peaceful).
It might also depend on what your definition of “democracy” is. If you lump in the democracy-by-name-only governments where the same dictator, er, democratically-elected President has won the election by a 99.8% majority for the past 20 years in a row, you can probably find some laws that would infringe on free speech as most other democracies know.
I don’t know what democracy is, but I know it when I see it
My mininum would be fair elections with a large percentage (say, 80+%) of citizens having a vote and 2 or more unaffiliated parties (or 20+ unaffiliated votees) every 6 years. But I’m just making this up as I type.
Well, the United States prohibits the Communist Party on the basis that it’s not a true political party, and is instead under foreign control and dedicated to overthrowing the current constitutional system.
