Free Press NOT a Luxury

As a politics student, I'm often told by more realist aligned scholars, professors, and politicos that a free society is a luxury in terms of nation-building and political economies. There is more or less an Maslow-esque order to the progression of a nation-state, and that the freedoms of expression are last on the list.

I'm beginning to wonder if this, like an increasing number of realist arguments, is bunk. The texting of Iranian youth during their most recent election, the encouraging steps by the Ugandan government in disclosure, and the Cambodian youth are all making me think that perhaps if we turned the pyramid on its side, that maybe nation building could be more democratically pragmatic and less purely capitalistic. Though I don't want to fall prey to Kant's lofty goals.