July 2022, Volume 33, Issue 3
Digital Propaganda: The Power of Influencers
Swarms of “nano-influencers,” are rapidly reshaping social-media propaganda campaigns, upending political discourse in democracies around the world.
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January 2016, Volume 27, Issue 1
The Authoritarian Threat: Weaknesses of Autocracy Promotion
While “autocracy promotion” presents a real danger, its influence so far has been limited. Because authoritarian regimes are concerned first with furthering their own interests, their interventions often have contradictory effects, sometimes even inadvertently fostering greater pluralism.
October 2024, Volume 35, Issue 4
China and the Battle for the Global South
Under Xi Jinping, the PRC has grown more assertive in the Global South. China aggressively targets country after country, often zeroing in on small but strategically significant states. But there are proven ways for even fragile democracies to resist Beijing’s influence.
April 2023, Volume 34, Issue 2
The Rise of Sportswashing
The staggering global popularity of soccer makes it a prime target for regimes that worry about the negative press they get for their undemocratic practices. The Gulf monarchies have led the way in getting into the wide world of sports as a means of cleaning their image.
July 2021, Volume 32, Issue 3
Latin America Erupts: Millennial Authoritarianism in El Salvador
Nayib Bukele has developed a blend of political tactics that combines populist appeals and classic autocratic behavior with a polished social-media brand. It poses a dire threat to the country’s democratic institutions.
Spring 1991, Volume 2, Issue 2
Documents on Democracy
Excerpts from: the draft constitution of the Russian Republic; a letter from the mayor of Budapest, Hungary to the mayor of Vilnius, Lithuania; the inaugural address Haitian president, Reverend Jean-Bertrand Astride.
July 1992, Volume 3, Issue 3
Documents on Democracy
Excerpts from: the Transitional Period Charter of Ethiopia; a pamphlet of the Free Trade Union of China; Russian president Boris Yeltsin’s declaration on Poland and Russia.
April 2016, Volume 27, Issue 2
Making Democratic Waves
A review of Making Waves: Democratic Contention in Europe and Latin America Since the Revolutions of 1848 by Kurt Weyland.
April 2021, Volume 32, Issue 2
Rebooting Democracy
A review of Reset: Reclaiming the Internet for Civil Society, by Ronald J. Deibert.
The Life of the Party
Online Exclusive by Patrick Quirk and Jan Surotchak | Establishment parties are flagging. They should learn from political disruptors.
April 2020, Volume 31, Issue 2
Viral Alarm: When Fury Overcomes Fear
The coronavirus outbreak has exposed the corrupt and rotten core of the Chinese Communist Party’s dictatorial rule over China. It is a moment of revelation. Can it also become one that leads to change?
April 2014, Volume 25, Issue 2
The Freedom House Survey for 2013: The Democratic Leadership Gap
Civil-liberties scores have notably declined over the past several years, while political-rights scores have slightly improved—perhaps because modern authoritarians have begun to adopt subtler means of repression. Overall, however, freedom experienced a global decline for the eighth straight year in 2013.
April 2011, Volume 22, Issue 2
Paradoxes of the New Authoritarianism
Why are the unfree regimes of the former Soviet world proving so durable? A lack of ideology and—perhaps surprisingly—a degree of openness are proving to be not so much problems for authoritarianism as bulwarks of it.
July 2018, Volume 29, Issue 3
Explaining Eastern Europe: Imitation and Its Discontents
For countries emerging from communism, the post-1989 imperative to “be like the West” has generated discontent and even a “return of the repressed,” as the region feels old nationalist stirrings and new demographic pressures.
October 2023, Volume 34, Issue 4
The Authoritarian Data Problem
AI is destined to become another stage for geopolitical conflict. In this contest, autocracies have the advantage, as they vacuum up valuable data from democracies, while democracies inevitably incorporate data tainted by repression.
July 2022, Volume 33, Issue 3
Combating Beijing’s Sharp Power: How Australia’s Civil Society Led the Way
Influence operations by the People’s Republic of China and its “united front” organs were exposed years ago, but civil society and Chinese-Australians were first in understanding how to counter them.
April 2015, Volume 26, Issue 2
The Authoritarian Resurgence: Iran Abroad
The Iranian regime has sought to recast conventional principles of human rights and political participation by forging alliances with like-minded regimes and by broadcasting its narrative to an international audience.
Just a month after its introduction, ChatGPT, the generative artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot, hit 100-million monthly users, making it the fastest-growing application in history. For context, it took the video-streaming service Netflix, now a household name, three-and-a-half years to reach one-million monthly users. But unlike Netflix, the meteoric rise of ChatGPT and its potential for…
January 2010, Volume 21, Issue 1
Twenty Years of Postcommunism: What’s the Matter with Russia?
The author analyses the confluence of several elements that helped to set Russia’s course: the influence of history; the challenges of the transformation process itself; the importance of leadership; and the role of the West.
What Putin Fears Most
Forget his excuses. Russia’s autocrat doesn’t worry about NATO. What terrifies him is the prospect of a flourishing Ukrainian democracy. 22 February 2022 By Robert Person and Michael McFaul Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has begun. Russian president Vladimir Putin wants you to believe that it’s NATO’s fault. He frequently has claimed (including again in an…