Hollowing out democracy: Hungary and beyond
Following the revolutions of 1989 that brought down communism in Central Europe, it appeared that the region was on the path to the consolidation of liberal democracy. This optimism, however,… Read more »
Category: National Endowment for Democracy
Is presidentialist democracy failing?
Perplexed by today’s turbulent American political scene? Not to worry: A distinguished political scientist wrote an essay 26 years ago that anticipated our predicament with eerie explanatory power. The only… Read more »
South Africa heading for crisis, collapse and ‘regime change’?
Amid heckling from the opposition, the South African president used his State of the Nation speech to try and redeem himself following a spending scandal. But calls for him to… Read more »
Angola in crisis: transparency, human rights & civil society
Current events suggest that Angola today faces an economic and political crisis. The global collapse of oil prices, a series of anti-NGO regulations, repressed protests, and the trial of… Read more »
‘Great Surge’ marks end of the Third World
The assertion that democracy is better than autocracy at facilitating the move into prosperity butts up against the theory that authoritarianism is more conducive to rapid economic growth (as… Read more »
Burkina Faso and the Sahel: Turning Points in Elections and Security
Sub-Saharan Africa was long seen as relatively immune to the call of Islamist militancy because of its unorthodox religious practices — rooted in Sufism, a more mystical mode of Islam… Read more »
Khomeini poll exclusion, consultant’s jailing send chilling message from Iran’s hardliners
After months of political maneuvering, the scion of the powerful Khomeini family and the projected figurehead of Iran’s ailing reform movement was definitively barred Wednesday from participating in parliamentary elections… Read more »
Qozhayya Chehwan seized from home by Syrian intel
I was born in December 1951, in northern Lebanon. I lived in the town of Batroun, raising a family of four children with my wife, and leading a quiet, peaceful… Read more »
North Korea: The Human Condition and Security Nexus
The Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea (HRNK), the George W. Bush Institute, the Yonsei Center for Human Liberty, and the National… Read more »
Baransu case prompts Turkey to lift media bans?
In a move that confirmed the growing restrictions and pressure on the Turkish media, Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmuş has said his government is ready to remove bans that… Read more »