Author Archives: DemDigest

Is liberal democracy resilient enough to confront current challenges?

     

Democracy is “not a one-way street,” and democratic nations can fall back into authoritarianism, according to Mike Abramowitz, president of Freedom House, and Sanford School Dean Judith Kelley. They joined moderator… Read more »

A 7-step program for fighting disinformation – proactively

     

While foreign influence operations are not new, the convergence of three larger global trends has made them a more important and acute challenge, analysts Carolyn Kenney, Max Bergmann, and James Lamond write in… Read more »

Authoritarian resurgence is a national security threat, Congress told

     

A group of national security experts testified Tuesday on Capitol Hill about the rise of authoritarianism, warning lawmakers that countries such as China and Russia are seeking to gain power by… Read more »

Russia’s Hostile Measures: Understanding the Threat

     

Russia has used a wide range of hostile measures — political, economic, diplomatic, intelligence, and military activities — to expand its influence and undermine governments across the European continent, note… Read more »

Transitions’ lessons offer a way out for Venezuela

     

Opposition leader Juan Guaido, who declared himself interim president of Venezuela in January, said he will return to the country “despite the risks.” Guaido defied a court travel ban last… Read more »

Illiberal toolkit entails ‘a simulacrum of democracy’

     

Conventional wisdom has long held that democratic consolidation is a one-way street and that democratic states, once reaching a certain level of GDP per capita, are immune to democratic breakdown…. Read more »

A new strategy to build resilience to extremism’s corrosive ideology

     

Extremism is enabled by the belief that existing indignities and suffering are the direct result of poor, undemocratic, or predatory governance, notes a new analysis. This sense of injustice aligns… Read more »

Digital threats to democracy: Russia and China ‘weaponizing new technologies’

     

As digital threats to democracy multiply, the U.S. military blocked Internet access to an infamous Russian entity seeking to sow discord among Americans during the 2018 midterms, several U.S. officials… Read more »

Autocracy’s Advance, Democracy’s Decline: National Security Implications

     

At the heart of the new era of geopolitical competition is a struggle over the role and influence of democracy in the international order, according to two prominent analysts. Recent power… Read more »