The desire for recognition, then, can provide the missing link
between liberal economics and liberal politics that was missing
from the economic account of History in Part II. Desire and reason
are together sufficient to explain the process of industrialization,
and a large part of economic life more generally. But they
cannot explain the striving for liberal democracy, which ultimately
arises out of thymos, the part of the soul that demands recognition.
The social changes that accompany advanced industrialization, in
particular universal education, appear to liberate a certain demand
for recognition that did not exist among poorer and less
educated people. As standards of living increase, as populations
become more cosmopolitan and better educated, and as society as
a whole achieves a greater equality of condition, people begin to
demand not simply more wealth but recognition of their status. If
people were nothing more than desire and reason, they would be
content to live in market-oriented authoritarian states like Franco's
Spain, or a South Korea or Brazil under military rule. But they also have a thymotic pride in their own self-worth, and this
leads them to demand democratic governments that treat them
like adults rather than children, recognizing their autonomy as
free individuals. Communism is being superseded by liberal democracy
in our time because of the realization that the former
provides a gravely defective form of recognition.