830 Results
April 2019, Volume 30, Issue 2
China’s 1989 democracy movement was brutally suppressed, but a former student leader argues that it also planted the seeds for the growth of Chinese civil society and for future democratization.
April 2024, Volume 35, Issue 2
The problem for democracy today is not capitalism; it is a decline in public honesty and civility. But there is an opportunity to revive our sense of national community, if we seize it.
October 2024, Volume 35, Issue 4
Political violence is rising in wealthy democracies. Polarized societies and bitter party politics are putting candidates and election officials in serious peril. Political leaders, more than anyone, have the power to stoke or stamp out this dangerous cycle of violence.
April 2025, Volume 36, Issue 2
A Ukrainian human-rights lawyer on moral responsibility during war; Nilofar Shidmehr’s poem “Say Her Name: Mahsa Jina Amini”; a Cuban prodemocracy activist vows to never give up; Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya on Belarus’s sham election; a Zimbabwean journalist turns himself in to police; the frontlines of the protests in Georgia; and an open letter to Xi Jinping.
This is the darkest moment for freedom in half a century. Whether democracy regains its footing will depend on how democratic leaders and citizens respond to emboldened authoritarians and the fissures within their own societies.
January 2018, Volume 29, Issue 1
Despite worries that terror groups can turn open societies’ very openness against them, the numbers reveal that liberal democracies enjoy significant advantages in resisting the threat of terrorism.
April 2018, Volume 29, Issue 2
Across the West, economic, demographic, and cultural shifts have spurred the rise of populists who embrace majoritarianism and popular sovereignty while showing little commitment to constitutionalism and individual liberty.
January 2023, Volume 34, Issue 1
When ordinary voters are given a choice between democracy and partisan loyalty, who will put democracy first? Frighteningly, Europe harbors a deep reservoir of authoritarian potential.
October 2024, Volume 35, Issue 4
The People’s Republic of China has entered a new age, abandoning the ideological openness of the reform era and the socialist legacy of the revolutionary period. Under Xi Jinping, regime stability trumps all — and the PRC is weaker and less stable as a result.
January 2025, Volume 36, Issue 1
With illiberal forces ascendant across the globe, protecting individual liberties and the democratic process is crucial. But when institutions empower minority groups over the majority, can democracy survive?
Reports on elections in Algeria, Azerbaijan, Jordan, Kiribati, Sint Maarten, and Sri Lanka.
Thailand’s voters — especially its young people — have sent the country’s junta a message: They want change now. But will the military listen? | Dan Slater
Marine Le Pen has remade her image to obscure her far-right populism. There is a real risk French voters won’t see through it. April 2022 By Agneska Bloch On April 24, French voters will go to the polls in a rematch of the 2017 presidential election: now President Emmanuel Macron versus far-right populist Marine Le…
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants the public to see his efforts to overhaul the Israeli judiciary as a “reform.” But people have seen it for what it is: a struggle over the very future of democracy itself. | Natan Sachs
What the opposition did and how Erdoğan managed to escape outright defeat. | Murat Somer and Jennifer McCoy
What the opposition did and how Erdoğan managed to escape outright defeat. By Murat Somer and Jennifer McCoy May 2023 Turkey’s hotly contested May 14 presidential and parliamentary elections saw a record turnout of 88.9 percent. Heading into the election, polls had given opposition candidate Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was supported by two alliances of opposition…
In 2021, democracy’s fortunes were tested, and a tumultuous world became even more turbulent. Democratic setbacks arose in places as far flung as Burma, El Salvador, Tunisia, and Sudan, and a 20-year experiment in Afghanistan collapsed in days. The world’s democracies were beset by rising polarization, and people watched in shock as an insurrection took…
Why Emmanuel Macron’s reelection hangs on him winning support from the very people he has ignored most. April 2022 By Moshik Temkin This month’s French presidential election is giving off a strong sense of déjà vu. As in 2017 and 2002, a center-right presidential candidate (this time, current president Emmanuel Macron) faces off in…
Nationwide protests against Xi Jinping’s zero-covid policy caught the Chinese Communist Party off-guard. Expect the Party’s security apparatus to strike back with quiet precision. | Sheena Chestnut Geitens
Why we must tackle the threat posed by Putin and his authoritarianism head on. May 2022 By David J. Kramer The best hope for democracy in Russia—and all of Eurasia—is for the international community to support Ukraine in its efforts to defeat Vladimir Putin. The stakes for Ukraine, Russia, and the entire globe, for that…
