Category: democratic regression

Migrants’ revolution has capacity to remake democracies

     

The thousands gathering at Europe’s borders, and the thousands who have already crossed, are widely but wrongly supposed to be refugees of an uprising that failed: the Arab spring. In… Read more »

Illiberal powers emboldened – Authoritarianism Goes Global

     

  Over the past decade,  and gained influence within the global arena. Leading authoritarian countries―including China, Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela―have developed new tools and strategies to contain the… Read more »

Halt Equatorial Guinea’s pre-election crackdown, say NGOs

     

The government of President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo of Equatorial Guinea should immediately cease its suppression of independent voices ahead of presidential elections, a group of human rights and democracy… Read more »

Is Democracy in Decline?

     

For all the commentary on democratic recession, there has been nothing like the kind of “reverse wave” that Samuel P. Huntington’s The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century… Read more »

Engage civil society in party-building to consolidate democracy

     

Criticizing U.S. missteps in promoting democracy is certainly reasonable—particularly in light of the debacles in Iraq and Libya—but elevating these criticisms into high doctrine and principled critiques of democracy promotion… Read more »

Egypt’s civil society crackdown: rights defenders at risk of prosecution

     

Fourteen global human rights groups today urged Egypt to halt a renewed crackdown on civil society and rights defenders. The demand came as President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi announced a cabinet… Read more »

Envoy Khalilzad’s knack for being in room while history was written

     

One of the most intriguing individuals to play a leading role in the Bush-era wars is Zalmay Khalilzad, a polished diplomat who was the most senior Muslim in the White… Read more »

Democracy in retreat?

     

Despite the current democratic regression, there are three reasons why democracy advocates should maintain hope for the future, says Carl Gershman, President of the National Endowment for Democracy. The first… Read more »

Democracy in the Arab World: Still a Mirage?

     

More than five years after the Arab Spring began, the euphoria that accompanied the region’s early uprisings has been replaced by a dogged realism, notes RAND analyst Seth G.Jones. From the indignant graffiti… Read more »

Obama Doctrine – pendulum swung too far?

     

  For any believer in the trans-Atlantic alliance, liberal interventionism and the overall beneficence of American power, President Obama’s long exposition of his foreign policy to Jeffrey Goldberg in The… Read more »