It just depends on whether there are emergencies or not. This isn't even a philosophical disagreement at a certain point; its just a matter of practicality. Kings emerged because of warbands. War- a highly time sensitive emergency- only functions with strict hierarchies. "Normal order" leads to all sorts of processes and procedures being generated to smooth out the natural inequities of strict hierarchies. When emergencies come, even in liberal societies, hierarchy overtakes process and procedure out of necessity. Technologically, we won't have kings again unless we have warbands again; we only won't have illiberalism again if we have no emergencies again. Carl Schmitt wrote a great book about this- its not about what we prefer, its about what is needed. I think assuming we will not have emergencies again is naive.
The genius of America has been our flexibility in slipping into illiberal modes, then slipping out of them again when no longer needed without disrupting society. We've had our dictatorial periods, but we simply forget them and pretend they didn't happen. That's way, way better than burning the world down during every transition, like France.
