Chile & Argentina were my first thoughts, maybe China under Deng? I was talking this through recently, I feel like there should be examples of countries stepping back from the edge, but they’re likely to be under discussed because “and then it got better, because the system mostly worked” is boring?
I wonder if the United States has itself been closer to the edge a few more times than we realize, and the history books don't really emphasize it.
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We absolutely have, which gives me a sliver of hope. The Know-Nothing party, the second rise of the KKK in the early 20th C with Wilson’s complicity. Heck even the first nullification crisis in the 1830s.