Financial Times Person of the Year: George Soros

The prestigious British business magazine has chosen George Soros as the Financial Times Person of the Year.

Portfolio reports that the Financial Times regards Soros as the representative of liberal democracy and of an open society – values that were victorious during the Cold War. The magazine further argues that the Hungarian-born American businessman has to face the strongest and most influential people in the world, like Vladimir Putin or Donald Trump, who are trying to ‘delegitimise his person’.

However, it is not only Soros who has a hard time against the forces of nationalism and populism but the ideas he stands for; namely, the balance of liberal democracy is in danger, too, all the way from Hungary to America.

The Financial Times argues that Soros is the only person who builds his own foreign policy as a private individual.

Soros, who has been fighting racism, intolerance and authoritarianism as a philanthropist for 30 years now, shared his own opinion on the backlash he constantly receives from national populists. More specifically, from those in Europe:

“I am blamed for everything; they even call me the Antichrist. I wish I did not have this many enemies, but I take it as a sign of me doing something right.”