"Fear or values - we must choose"

(This text was published in the Portuguese weekly magazine Visão)

Fear or Values – You Must Choose

The flood of information around us brings a constant stream of unsettling themes. From wars to climate disruption, from the impact of Artificial Intelligence to the global collapse of trust in political leaders, from young people’s anxiety about the future to the toxic debate over migration — our societies increasingly seem unable to find effective answers to the many problems that overwhelm them.

Understandably, this fuels insecurity. More and more people are drawn to radical alternatives, even if that means abandoning values and principles that not long ago felt unshakable within democratic life.

There isn’t one simple explanation for this shift, but if I had to choose a single word, it would be fear.

Fear, as a political force, is anything but passive. It’s an active fuel — refined and injected into public debate by algorithms that reward outrage and by a media ecosystem that profits from anger.

This attention economy creates a vicious circle: the sense of chaos drives people to seek easy, often authoritarian solutions, which then erode democracy’s complex decision-making processes even further. Our biggest crisis is not only the number of problems we face, but our collective inability to handle them without falling into panic. And populism, of course, pretends to be the cure — but it’s only a symptom.

Fear is natural, but intelligence can always overcome it. People want predictability in their lives, even if some risk comes with it. We all know danger exists — yet we like to believe we can manage it by the choices we make. What nobody wants, though, is the unexpected threat around the corner, the confrontation with an unknown danger to ourselves or those we care about.

Perhaps it’s just an illusion, but ordinary citizens have come to see public authorities as a kind of police against social disorder. Politicians in a democracy are expected to provide reassurance — to show there’s a plan for the next day. The trouble is that these figures have lost much of their credibility, and that loss weakens their ability to make people feel safe. Today, it’s simply common to assume that every politician might be using their position for personal gain.

Whether this suspicion is rooted in real guilt or in campaigns to discredit public servants is another question. The point is that doubt now hangs over politics itself.

In modern democracies, political life is becoming shorter. Leaders have less and less time to succeed before public patience runs out. Meanwhile, the decline of the big “catch-all” parties has led to fragmentation — small ideological movements rise, fragile coalitions form, and governments fall into recurring cycles of instability.

A Divided World

The same insecurity that corrodes democracies from within has also spread internationally.

After the Cold War — which shook but didn’t destroy the post-1945 order — the world seemed relatively calm. Many believed the defeated side had accepted its place, and that the global divide was gone for good. That illusion ended with the war in Ukraine.

The multilateral system, with the United Nations and international law at its core, has largely collapsed. Collective trust is gone — and ironically, today’s United States helped dismantle the very mechanisms of cooperation they once built. The moral cowardice the West showed in Gaza, and Europe’s ongoing cynicism in dealing with power politics, have completed the picture. Ordinary citizens, already disillusioned with national institutions, now face the collapse of the global framework that once gave a sense of order.

What Can We Do?

This is not a comforting message; uncertainty is part of it. But if we ask what truly matters for the near future, the answer is simple: our values.

Whatever doubts we may have, the only responsible way to face uncertain times is to stand firm on the basics that define us. In politics, that means defending democracy and rejecting exceptionalism. In society, it means rejecting sectarian and discriminatory ideologies. It means standing up for truth — exposing lies, disinformation, and fear-mongering.

But holding firm to values is not just about words; it’s about daily practice. It means valuing slow, investigative journalism over viral gossip. It means demanding transparency, even from the politicians we support. It means recognising that the world’s problems are complex — and refusing to blame easy scapegoats. These are the real foundations of a healthy civic life: an independent, transparent justice system; education that teaches critical thinking; and a public space where reasoned debate isn’t drowned out by shouting.

Fighting and educating against the populism of fear is the only struggle that truly matters — against the fear of what is different, diverse, or contradictory.

2026 will bring “challenges,” as people like to say. But let’s drop the euphemisms. It will be a year like any other — full of uncertainty about the future. The difference will lie in how we face it. Some will choose to defend their values. Others will give in, abandoning principles in the name of fear.

The choice is yours.