Category: Authoritarianism

Can Romania recapitalize trust in democracy?

     

Fifty years on from the crushing of the Prague Spring and almost 30 years after the 1989 revolutionary upheaval, Eastern Europe is experiencing a vicious return to authoritarianism, according to… Read more »

Populists and authoritarians are ‘taking over the global economy’

     

  Populists and authoritarians now manage the largest bloc of the G-20 economies, according to a new analysis. When you add up the nominal output of the G-20 states plus… Read more »

Russian ‘mood swing’? High level of dissent ‘points to trouble for Putin’

     

Economic conditions for most Russians are about to get much worse, say analysts [HT: Paul Goble]. That makes grim reading for the Kremlin alongside news that Vladimir Putin’s personal support hit… Read more »

Orban’s Hungary offers a ‘glimpse of Europe’s demise’?

     

At a bucolic border post, Western-trained Hungarian counterintelligence agents recently got word that a known operative of Russia’s foreign spy service was driving into Hungary, and asked headquarters for permission… Read more »

Putin’s conservative rhetoric fueling ‘demoskepticism’?

     

Does conservative support for such illiberal rulers as Poland’s Jaroslaw Kaczynski and Hungary’s Viktor Orbán indicate growing “demoskepticism” on the right? Some conservatives now dismiss policies that are infused with… Read more »

Can Poland’s ‘authoritarian turn’ be stopped?

     

Poland’s populist Law and Justice Party appears intent on imposing quasi-authoritarian control over its unruly democracy, analyst Max Boot writes for Commentary.   A new draft Law on Higher Education… Read more »

To integrate Islamist parties, invest in civil society

     

If Egypt’s liberal activists had tolerated Islamist leader Mohamed Morsi’s illiberal but weak rule until he could be voted out, democracy might have had a chance, David D. Kirkpatrick suggests… Read more »

Which model for ASEAN – Cambodia or Malaysia?

     

Which political model are countries in the ASEAN region more likely to follow – Cambodia or Malaysia? analyst Simon Roughneen asks in the Nikkei Asian Review. With an increasingly powerful… Read more »

McCain passing the torch at democracy institute

     

For the first time in 25 years, the International Republican Institute will have a new leader. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who is battling brain cancer, has decided to step down… Read more »

West’s Iron Curtain ‘would be most effective tool against Putin’s kleptocracy’

     

There is a major difference between former Soviet leaders and senior Russian officials today, including Russian President Vladimir Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister [Sergey] Lavrov, whose families are abroad, former… Read more »