July 2012, Volume 23, Issue 3
Putinism Under Siege: The Protesters and the Public
After the December 2011 State Duma elections, the Russian opposition and civil society quickly launched large protest rallies in response to electoral fraud.
1931 Results
Nayib Bukele self-deprecating slogan July 2019 article
July 2012, Volume 23, Issue 3
Putinism Under Siege: Can There Be a Color Revolution?
The recent protests in Russia raise the question of whether the Putin regime could fall to a “color” or electoral revolution like those that have ousted other autocratic regimes in postcommunist Europe and Eurasia over the past decade and a half.
July 2012, Volume 23, Issue 3
The DRC’s Crumbling Legitimacy
On 9 December 2011, incumbent president Joseph Kabila was declared the official winner of the DRC’s deeply flawed presidential election, resulting in a legal president without legitimacy and an uncertain political future.
July 2012, Volume 23, Issue 3
Senegal: What Will Turnover Bring?
Although Senegal has often been regarded as a democracy, its regime should more properly have been classified as competitive authoritarian. Will the 2012 election of a new president prove to be a turning point?
July 2012, Volume 23, Issue 3
Hungary’s Illiberal Turn: How Things Went Wrong
How has Hungary, initially seen as a leading postcommunist success story, fallen into its current troubles?
July 2012, Volume 23, Issue 3
Hungary’s Illiberal Turn: Disabling the Constitution
In Hungary’s 2010 general elections, Fidesz won 68 percent of the seats in parliament—allowing it to impose a wholly new constitutional order.
July 2024, Volume 35, Issue 3
Southeast Asia’s Toxic Alliances
What some elites in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand portray as “unity” is nothing more than a corrupt bargain meant to cheat voters of their right to decide their country’s political future before a single ballot is cast.
July 2024, Volume 35, Issue 3
Pakistan’s Coming Crisis
Pakistani voters sent the military a message in the February elections: They no longer trust the “guardian of the country.” Worse for the generals, they can no longer escape accountability for their corruption and incompetence because everyone knows the military is in charge.
July 2024, Volume 35, Issue 3
Is Democracy Bad for LGBT+ Rights?
LGBT+ rights are under threat across the globe. Populist leaders stirring fear and animosity for political gain understand how democratic institutions can be harnessed and manipulated to curtail these rights, not enshrine them.
July 2020, Volume 31, Issue 3
South Korea’s Democratic Decay
Although South Korea is praised for its success at fighting covid-19, the triumph came at a cost to rights and privacy, and is drawing attention away from a larger drift toward illiberalism and bitterly factionalized politics.
July 2012, Volume 23, Issue 3
Oil, Politics, and Ghana’s Democracy
Ghana has won praise for its steady progress toward democratic consolidation. In late 2010 it joined the ranks of the world’s oil producers. Will the democratic institutions be able to resist the “resource curse”?
October 2022, Volume 33, Issue 4
Documents on Democracy
Excerpts from: Burma’s National Unity Government statement on execution of four prodemocracy activists by military junta; UN Human Rights Commission report on the treatment of Uyghurs in China’s Xinjiang region; international NGO statement on closure of Uganda’s leading LGBTQ rights advocacy organization; the Prague Manifesto for a Free Ukraine; Zov, a Russian soldier’s memoir.
October 2004, Volume 15, Issue 4
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Indonesia, Lithuania, Mongolia, Philippines, and Serbia.
April 2004, Volume 15, Issue 2
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Georgia, Guatemala, Guinea, Iran, Russia, and Serbia.
October 2013, Volume 24, Issue 4
Tracking the “Arab Spring”: Egypt’s Failed Transition
The July 2013 military takeover has squashed democratic hopes in Egypt, at least for now. How did things go so wrong, and what lessons are to be drawn from this lamentable episode? Listen to the podcast with Author Nathan Brown [mp3]
October 2022, Volume 33, Issue 4
The Politics of Enemies
Democracy’s meaning has always been contested. Letting that struggle become a battle between existential foes risks upending the whole democratic project.
July 2014, Volume 25, Issue 3
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Afghanistan, Algeria, Colombia, Egypt, El Salvador, Guinea-Bissau, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Kosovo, Libya, Lithuania, Macedonia, Malawi, Maldives, Mauritania, Panama, Serbia, Slovakia, South Africa, and Ukraine.
October 2009, Volume 20, Issue 4
Documents on Democracy
Excerpts from: a statement issued by Iranian opposition candidate Mir Hosein Musavi; the Organization of American States’ resolution suspending Honduras from the organization; UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon’s message to the fifth ministerial conference of the Community of Democracies; a speech given newly re-elected Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh.
January 2023, Volume 34, Issue 1
Documents on Democracy
Featuring Canadian deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland’s remarks on defending democracy; a letter by Chinese and Hong Kong socialists on China’s “zero-covid” protests; Shervin Hajipour’s song “Baraye,” the unofficial anthem of the protests in Iran; Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen’s remarks on shoring up democratic resilience in Taiwan and globally; and Gambian human-rights lawyer Fatou Bensouda’s…
January 2011, Volume 22, Issue 1
Constraining Government Power in Africa
African politics is often characterized as a realm of “informality,” but formal rules and institutions actually loom large, especially with regard to overweening executive power and the reforms that may help to rein it in.