Fostering resiliency for MENA civil society
The Gezi trial, where 16 civil society activists and human rights defenders face possible life sentences for attempting to overthrow the government, has been a “tragic case study of the… Read more »
Author Archives: DemDigest
Building democratic resilience against weaponized disinformation
Social media and the Internet pose an acute threat to democracy, but probably not in the way that most people assume, says a leading expert. Many people believe that the… Read more »
Competitive authoritarianism ‘inching westward’
In the nineteen-thirties, authoritarian regimes were on the rise around the world—as they are again today—and democratic governments that came into existence after the First World War were toppling. “American… Read more »
What are the ‘primary drivers’ behind democracy’s regression?
The latest edition of The Economist Intelligence Unit’s annual Democracy Index, assessing the state of global democracy in 2019, recorded the worst average global score since the index began in… Read more »
Mexico: criminal defamation threatens free expression
The conviction of a prominent Mexican journalist sets a dangerous precedent for freedom of expression, writes Enrique Bravo-Escobar, Ph.D., Senior Program Officer for Latin America & the Caribbean at the… Read more »
How to target the Cubazuela axis
Cuban civil society and human rights activists are expressing concern over the fate of former political prisoner Rolando Rodriguez Lobaina. Four days ago, the freelance journalist and human rights… Read more »
‘Zeitgeist of deepening anxiety’ over democratic backsliding
Authoritarian resurgence is puzzling intellectually because the dominant theoretical paradigm during the past four decades has focused on explaining the drivers of democratic advance, not retreat, says a leading analyst…. Read more »
How to fix democracy
Democracy has many advantages, but its pitfalls include a tendency toward short-term return over longer-term interests, being reactive rather than proactive, and being geared towards internal competition rather than cooperation,… Read more »
Ukraine faces challenges of history and diplomacy
During the final days of January, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky carried out two sensitive “working visits,” to Israel and Poland. They were connected with the 75th anniversary of the liberation of… Read more »
Why democracy is good for you — and vice versa
Midnight military coups and backroom deals did not bring strongmen to power in former democracies that have joined the ranks of the world’s autocracies. Everyday frustrations over high health-care costs,… Read more »