Could big data destroy liberal democracy?
Data is the new source of political power, Yuval Noah Harari tells NPR. He explains his worries that big data and AI technology threaten to destroy liberal democracy in a… Read more »
Category: Eurasia
Digital authoritarianism grows, net freedom declines, democracy ‘withers’
Democracy is “withering” under the influence of growing digital authoritarianism, with China especially culpable for its efforts to export its Great Firewall of internet censorship, a watchdog group warned today…. Read more »
Managed Confrontation: policy takes aim at illicit Russian cash
The financial sectors of the UK and other Western democracies “have helped to facilitate the authoritarianism and systemic corruption that blights Russia,” according to a new analysis from Chatham House,… Read more »
‘Rogue actors’ making digital technology incompatible with democracy
The internet is the technology paradox writ more monstrous than ever. It’s a nonpareil tool for learning, roving and constructive community-building. But it’s unrivaled, too, in the spread of… Read more »
Bellingcat – ‘a thorn in the Kremlin’s side’
The investigative website Bellingcat has found itself at the heart of some of the Kremlin’s touchiest affairs over the last few years—starting with the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern… Read more »
End impunity for crimes against Azerbaijan’s journalists
A free media is an essential pillar for keeping governments accountable and citizens informed. That’s why authoritarian regimes such as the one in Azerbaijan seek to intimidate, harass and silence… Read more »
Defending Digital Democracy via Election Cybersecurity Scorecard
More than 120 state and local election officials, communications directors, IT managers, and secretaries of state ran drills simulating security catastrophes that could happen on the worst Election Day imaginable,… Read more »
Kleptocratic solidarity: Russia aids Venezuela’s ‘mafia state’
Russia has sent a senior delegation to Venezuela to consult high-ranking government officials on a plan to stem the brutal economic collapse in a key Kremlin ally, Bloomberg reports: Venezuela… Read more »
In ‘an authoritarian era’, how to advance democracy?
There’s a rising angst in foreign policy circles over the status of democracy around the world, CNBC reports. “This is an authoritarian era, all things being equal. Democracy is in… Read more »
Putin’s Russia: emergence of democratic alternative an unlikely scenario?
Authoritarian rule is not imposed on Russians from above but is solicited from below by the people themselves, claims Sergey Karaganov, a former Putin advisor and one of Russia’s leading… Read more »