Plenty of critics have adopted “illiberal democracy” as a description not just of Hungary, but of redesigned political systems in countries as different as Poland and Turkey. Yet “illiberal democracy”… Read more »
In many Western democracies, the rise of populism has coincided with the collapse of traditional center-left parties, as working-class voters shift their allegiance, argues William A. Galston, senior fellow in… Read more »
Measures announced last month to strengthen the leadership role of the Chinese Communist Party and remove term limits for President Xi Jinping have raised fears about the increasingly authoritarian trajectory… Read more »
Russian attempts to fuel dissent and spread disinformation have been exposed by a cache of leaked documents that show what the Kremlin is prepared to pay for hacking, propaganda and… Read more »
The Arab Spring surely satisfies the three criteria for a black swan event: surprising, historically consequential, and rationalized by hindsight, notes the World Bank’s Elena Ianchovichina, author of Eruptions of… Read more »
The violent collapse of the Arab Spring has damaged the cause of liberal politics not just in the Middle East, but around the world. Strongman leaders are back in fashion… Read more »
In the aftermath of World War II, the victorious Western countries forged institutions — NATO, the European Union, and the World Trade Organization — that aimed to keep the peace… Read more »
We have moved from a world of ideological struggles in the 20th century to a world of geopolitical struggles in the 21st—or so goes the conventional wisdom. But technology is… Read more »
The quality of worldwide democracy and governance has fallen to its lowest level in 12 years, with much of the decline occurring in free societies where some governments rule with… Read more »
Could democracy die in the US? Is a new wave of authoritarianism sweeping the world? Is the west about to be engulfed by civil conflict? FT columnist Gideon Rachman asks:… Read more »
