October 2022, Volume 33, Issue 4
The Value of “Tyrannophobia”
Democratic death has been exaggerated. But fear that a democracy is going to break down may, ironically, be one of the things that protects it.
2779 Results
game of thrones friendly 1377x
January 2025, Volume 36, Issue 1
The Source of Georgia’s Democratic Resilience
Even as Georgia lurches toward autocracy, the country’s pluralism and democratic culture are deepening. What can Georgia’s contradictory trends reveal about democratic resilience?
July 2005, Volume 16, Issue 3
Transitions from Postcommunism
What made the “color revolutions” of the early 2000s possible? There were 7 factors that allowed for these democratic breakthroughs. Today, Venezuela has 6 of them, and it may soon have the last one it needs.
April 2025, Volume 36, Issue 2
How Autocrats Use Proxies to Control the Media
Propaganda is autocrats’ weapon of first resort, allowing them to rely on persuasion rather than violence to achieve their ends. But citizens have grown savvy, so autocrats are taking a new tack: spreading their messages via private news outlets indirectly controlled by regime proxies.
April 2025, Volume 36, Issue 2
Neoliberalism and the Third Wave
Democracy across the world is being undermined by the very forces that once made it possible: the liberal economic order and political competition. The global concentration of wealth has made democratic governance less effective and stripped the people of their power.
January 2019, Volume 30, Issue 1
The Fates of Third-Wave Democracies
Since their transitions, the democracies of the “third wave” have followed a range of trajectories beyond simple survival or breakdown. Many have stagnated at low levels of democracy and some have suffered democratic erosion, but there also have been cases of democratic deepening against the odds.
July 2025, Volume 36, Issue 3
Bolivia’s Silent Destruction
Bolivia’s Amazon forests are becoming scorched earth, with millions of acres lost each year to raging fires. Worse, this disaster is being caused by a government more interested in corrupt profits than protecting its people and wildlife.
October 2004, Volume 15, Issue 4
The Quality of Democracy: An Overview
Since most of the world’s sovereign states are now democracies, there is a growing scholarly focus on “good” or “better” democracy, and on how improvements can not only be measured, but encouraged.
April 2024, Volume 35, Issue 2
What Went Wrong in Hungary
For a time, Hungary looked like it was on the road to democracy. Viktor Orbán’s success derailing it may teach us how to spot a failing democracy before it is too late.
April 2014, Volume 25, Issue 2
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Bangladesh, Chile, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Libya, Madagascar, Mali, and Thailand.
October 2023, Volume 34, Issue 4
How AI Threatens Democracy
Generative AI can flood the media, internet, and even personal correspondence, sowing confusion for voters and government officials alike. If we fail to act, mounting mistrust will polarize our societies and tear at our institutions.
July 2002, Volume 13, Issue 3
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Algeria, Bahamas, Burkina Faso, Chad, Colombia, the Comoros, Congo-Brazzaville, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, East Timor, Hungary, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mali, São Tomé and Príncipe, Sierra Leone, Ukraine, Vanuatu, and Zimbabwe.
January 2002, Volume 13, Issue 1
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Argentina, Bangladesh, Bulgaria, The Gambia, Honduras, Mauritania, Nicaragua, Poland, Sri Lanka, and Taiwan.
July 2005, Volume 16, Issue 3
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Central African Republic, Ethiopia, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Togo, and Zimbabwe.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Burundi, Guyana, Mali, Poland, Serbia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Suriname, and Vanuatu.
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…
April 2025, Volume 36, Issue 2
Delivering for Democracy: Why Results Matter
Voters around the world are losing faith in democracy’s ability to deliver and increasingly turning toward more authoritarian alternatives. To restore citizens’ confidence, democracies must show they can make progress without sacrificing accountability.
April 2012, Volume 23, Issue 2
Discovering the “State-Nation”
A review of Crafting State-Nations: India and Other Multinational Democracies by Alfred Stepan, Juan J. Linz, and Yogendra Yadav.
April 2015, Volume 26, Issue 2
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Comoros, Croatia, El Salvador, Estonia, Lesotho, Mauritius, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, Tunisia, and Zambia.
October 2018, Volume 29, Issue 4
Election Watch
Reports on elections in Cambodia, Maldives, Mali, Mauritania, Mexico, Pakistan, Rwanda, Swaziland, Turkey, and Zimbabwe.