January 2025, Volume 36, Issue 1
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 2024, Volume 35, Issue 3
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
There is a troubling tension around “people power” in Africa today: African social movements are among the most successful at ousting autocrats. But the continent’s entrenched antidemocratic institutions leave these victories highly vulnerable to reversal.
January 2024, Volume 35, Issue 1
The BJP is ruling with a heavier hand than ever before, attacking opponents and silencing critics. Ironically, these may be the ideal conditions for a democratic revival—if the opposition seizes the moment.
October 2023, Volume 34, Issue 4
Almost no one expected a little-known candidate to defeat the ruling antidemocratic regime at the ballot box. But the Guatemalan opposition, backed by the international community, exploited the criminal oligarchy’s fissures to halt the country’s authoritarian slide.
July 2023, Volume 34, Issue 3
Behind today’s authoritarian wave are democratically elected leaders who use and abuse institutions to undermine the system that brought them to power. But with the right strategies, opposition forces can slow or stop these would-be autocrats.
January 2023, Volume 34, Issue 1
The record shows that movements using “dilemma actions”—creative protests that make a regime look foolish—are often more effective at undermining authoritarians. Activists should add such tactics to their toolkit.
October 2022, Volume 33, Issue 4
Opposition movements often boycott rigged polls rather than risk legitimizing an autocrat. It is usually a mistake. Here is the playbook for how one opposition seized the advantage.
July 2022, Volume 33, Issue 3
The case of Hungary shows how autocrats can rig elections legally, using legislative majorities to change the law and neutralize the opposition at every turn, no matter what strategy they adopt.
April 2022, Volume 33, Issue 2
The country’s opposition beat an authoritarian incumbent by unifying, organizing its supporters, and contesting every election no matter the odds. Can the strategy be applied elsewhere?
April 2022, Volume 33, Issue 2
It was no secret Daniel Ortega was bent on dismantling his country’s democracy. But by the time his opponents joined forces, it was too late. A cautionary tale for all democrats.
January 2022, Volume 33, Issue 1
Halting a decade of democratic backsliding, Haikainde Hichilema defeated an increasingly iron-fisted incumbent president. How did he do it and can others learn from his example?
October 2021, Volume 32, Issue 4
Mass uprisings toppled dictators in both Sudan and Algeria in 2019, but only Sudan was able to secure a transition to democracy due to important differences in their protest movements, militaries, and the role of the international community.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
Well-organized demonstrations are rocking the 26-year-old dictatorship of President Alyaksandr Lukashenka. Inside the movement and why it rose when it did.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
In a country where opposition forces were long marginalized and dictator Alyaksandr Lukashenka faced little serious threat to his rule, Belarus’s 2020 antirevolutionary protest movement has changed the game.
October 2019, Volume 30, Issue 4
Amid mass protests, the personalist autocracy of longtime Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir fell to an April 2019 coup. With the country now being governed by a council composed of both opposition leaders and powerful security-service coupmakers, prospects for democratization remain uncertain.
October 2019, Volume 30, Issue 4
In 2011–13, the undemocratic political outlook of both secular and Islamist actors helped to ensure the failure of democracy in Egypt. Today, the populace appears to have backed away from democratic demands, yet pockets of resilient activism offer a basis for hope.
July 2019, Volume 30, Issue 3
Stymied in his effort to secure a third term, President Joseph Kabila manipulated the electoral process in order to secure a compliant successor.
April 2019, Volume 30, Issue 2
It was the impact of Tiananmen that made the democracy movement in Hong Kong a mass phenomenon. Today, the democratic cause in Hong Kong remains linked to the democratic cause in China as a whole.
April 2019, Volume 30, Issue 2
In 2018, a peaceful protest movement brought down Armenia’s semiauthoritarian government and ushered in a new political era, the culmination of a long struggle for national pride, self-determination, and democracy.
January 2019, Volume 30, Issue 1
Zimbabwe’s first elections since the November 2017 coup that ousted nonagenarian dictator Robert Mugabe were marred by the abuse of state resources, electoral irregularities, and a tragic bout of postelection violence that saw soldiers use deadly force against civilians.
January 2019, Volume 30, Issue 1
A crackdown on the opposition, followed by sham parliamentary elections in July 2018, has deepened and extended the decades-long personalist dictatorship of Hun Sen.
October 2018, Volume 29, Issue 4
In Malaysia’s May 2018 general election, a grand bargain between ex–prime minister Mahathir Mohamad and reform leader Anwar Ibrahim produced a political earthquake that ended 61 years of rule by the United Malays National Organization (UMNO).
July 2018, Volume 29, Issue 3
When nonviolent mass protests occur under authoritarian regimes, the military plays a key role in determining the outcome: the hardening of the dictatorship, a new authoritarian regime, or a transition to democracy.
April 2018, Volume 29, Issue 2
Despite current trends, Chinese thinkers friendly to human rights and liberal democracy have left behind a treasury of thought from which their country may one day draw new inspiration.
April 2018, Volume 29, Issue 2
A review of Democracy in Iran: Why It Failed and How It Might Succeed by Misagh Parsa.
January 2018, Volume 29, Issue 1
Central African autocrats are using their stolen money to outmaneuver opponents and deflect international criticism.
October 2017, Volume 28, Issue 4
Wrongly viewed by many media sources as a victory for “reform” and “openness,” the recent presidential election in Iran actually reflected the demoralization and disengagement of the country’s prodemocratic opposition.
October 2017, Volume 28, Issue 4
More Russians are rejecting the Kremlin’s corruption and authoritarianism. They—and not the regime—are Russia’s future.
July 2017, Volume 28, Issue 3
Since Tanzania’s 2015 elections, rising repression and opposition protest have displaced an older dynamic of comparatively restrained and unchallenged dominance by the ruling party.
April 2017, Volume 28, Issue 2
Two of the Arab world’s more liberal regimes, the kingdoms of Jordan and Morocco, are sometimes said to be evolving toward democracy. Is this true, and what are the longer-term prospects for these two monarchies?
April 2017, Volume 28, Issue 2
This small West African country voted a longtime dictator out of the presidency. This victory for democracy was seemingly snatched away by his refusal to leave power—yet a breathtaking reversal lay in store.
January 2017, Volume 28, Issue 1
The Editors’ introduction to “Britain After Brexit.”
January 2017, Volume 28, Issue 1
The referendum campaign and its aftermath have exposed fault lines between the “two Britains” that have been long in the making and that pose stark questions about national values and identity.
January 2017, Volume 28, Issue 1
Just two years after voting to stay in the United Kingdom, Scotland voted to remain in the EU while Britain as a whole voted to leave. Is another independence referendum coming?
January 2017, Volume 28, Issue 1
The British decision to leave the EU raises difficult challenges for the still-delicate settlement upon which peace and stability in Northern Ireland depend.
January 2017, Volume 28, Issue 1
The British party system is being fundamentally reshaped by the consequences of the British decision to leave the EU, which also threatens to reduce Britain’s influence on the rest of the world.
January 2017, Volume 28, Issue 1
When parts of the Turkish military attempted a coup in July 2016, the competitive authoritarian AKP regime was able to bring both its competitive and its authoritarian features to bear, stopping the coup and launching a crackdown.
January 2017, Volume 28, Issue 1
The September 2016 Legislative Council election marked the rise of a new political force that emphasizes the specific interests and identity of Hong Kong. It has especially been championed by many of the young people who swelled 2014’s Umbrella Movement protests.
July 2016, Volume 27, Issue 3
The interplay between elections, popular protests, and international pressures has a profound effect on the behavior of African autocrats and their ability to stay in power even after their time is up.
July 2016, Volume 27, Issue 3
As more and more African presidents attempt to remove or circumvent constitutional term limits, African populations increasingly are mobilizing en masse, at great risk, to defend their constitutions.
April 2015, Volume 26, Issue 2
Iran’s authoritarianism is more flexible and more durable than its detractors would hope, yet more fragile and endangered than its defenders claim.
April 2015, Volume 26, Issue 2
China has gone back on its well-documented vow (and solemn treaty obligation) to allow Hong Kong genuine universal suffrage. Abrogated commitments and fake democracy are not the path to a thriving Hong Kong that feels at home within the People’s Republic of China.
April 2015, Volume 26, Issue 2
The demonstrations of late 2014 captured the world’s attention with their scale, passion, and resourcefulness, but in the end were unable to move dug-in local and national authorities. Yet time is still on the side of the demonstrators.
October 2014, Volume 25, Issue 4
The protests that have been erupting around the world may signal the twilight of both the idea of revolution and the notion of political reformism.
July 2014, Volume 25, Issue 3
Read the full essay here. The Editors’ introduction to “The Maidan and Beyond.”
July 2014, Volume 25, Issue 3
The events surrounding the EuroMaidan cannot be understood apart from the preceding five years of increasingly corrupt and authoritarian rule.
July 2014, Volume 25, Issue 3
Despite the spirit of participation that characterized the Maidan, organized civil society groups were not a key factor.
July 2014, Volume 25, Issue 3
Survey data reveal the makeup of the crowds in the Maidan and the factors that motivated them to take part in the protests.
July 2014, Volume 25, Issue 3
Ukrainians flocked to the Maidan to express a “choice for Europe,” but they may also have forged the beginnings of a new Ukrainian identity.
October 2013, Volume 24, Issue 4
Popular uprisings have occurred only in some Arab states and in even fewer have authoritarian rulers been overthrown. What factors allow us to predict whether an authoritarian regime will be vulnerable?
July 2013, Volume 24, Issue 3
Today’s Russian protest movement in many ways resembles past civil-rights and civil-resistance efforts in other parts of the world, from its commitment to nonviolence to its key demands—a vote that counts and equality under the law. Listen to the podcast.
July 2013, Volume 24, Issue 3
The Putin regime, having faced its first real challenge in the form of mass protests after the 2011 Duma elections, is responding with a series of laws intended to intimidate its civil society opposition, if not stamp it out altogether.
April 2013, Volume 24, Issue 2
Although declines in freedom outnumbered gains yet again in 2012, the year was not without some significant progress, most notably in the case of Libya.
April 2012, Volume 23, Issue 2
Of all the “Arab Spring” countries, so far only Tunisia has managed to make a transition to democracy. Tunisians now have a chance to show the world a new example of how religion, society, and the state can relate to one another under democratic conditions.
July 2008, Volume 19, Issue 3
The “color revolutions” in the postcommunist countries cannot be attributed to diffusion alone. Structural factors offer a better explanation of why such revolutions have succeeded in some countries and not in others.
July 2008, Volume 19, Issue 3
Emerging from one of the world’s most notorious failed states, Somaliland has become an oasis of relative democratic stability in the troubled Horn of Africa. What does its story teach us about democratic state-building?
July 2008, Volume 19, Issue 3
Ukraine gained independence in 1991, but its people gained their freedom only in 2004 with the Orange Revolution—an uprising of the human spirit in which Ukrainians joined together to gain a voice in their future.
July 1998, Volume 9, Issue 3
A review of China’s Transition, by Andrew Nathan.
July 1996, Volume 7, Issue 3
Read the full essay here.
October 1995, Volume 6, Issue 4
Review of Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela (1994).
July 1994, Volume 5, Issue 3
Read the full essay here.
April 1993, Volume 4, Issue 2
Read the full essay here.
January 1992, Volume 3, Issue 1
Read the full essay here.
Fall 1990, Volume 1, Issue 4
Read the full essay here.
Fall 1990, Volume 1, Issue 4
Read the full essay here.
Fall 1990, Volume 1, Issue 4
Winter 1990, Volume 1, Issue 1
The following text is based upon remarks presented by Wuer Kaixi in Washington, D.C. on 2 August 1989 at a meeting cosponsored by the Congressional Human Rights Foundation and the National Endowment for Democracy.
Winter 1990, Volume 1, Issue 1
This past spring the world looked on in wonder as millions filled the streets of Beijing and 80 other Chinese cities, defying the Communist regime and demanding democracy.
Winter 1990, Volume 1, Issue 1
Over the past several years, the world has come to see the crisis in Panama mainly as a confrontation between the United States and Panama's military strongman, General Manuel Antonio Noriega. But this perception – reinforced lately by press reports on last October's failed coup attempt – is badly mistaken.
Cuba’s dictatorship has kept student movements under its thumb for decades. But the regime’s repressive tactics have inadvertently breathed new life into a new generation of student activists. These young people are willing to fight for the island’s freedom.
Turkey’s president would rather turn his country into a full autocracy than give up power. But the Turkish people are clinging to what remains of their democracy, and they are ready to fight for it.
Evan Mawarire never thought of himself as a revolutionary. In a gripping new memoir, he tells the story of how he went from a humble clergyman to the leader of a movement that helped the Zimbabwean people find their voice.
The people have taken to the streets to demonstrate against corruption and Prime Minister Robert Fico’s pro-Moscow policies. Once again, Slovaks see their future in Europe, not Russia.
It is almost a year since the death of Alexei Navalny. The Russian opposition leader sought to channel Russian nationalism as a challenge to Putin’s autocracy. He gave everything in the fight.
People are calling for a so-called unity government to stem the violence in Mozambique. But there is a better way to set the country on the right course.
Georgians have returned to the streets to fight for their country’s future. They refuse to let it slip quietly into the autocracy the ruling party seeks.
A Hong Kong court just handed out heavy sentences to 45 democracy activists. The pro-Beijing government is taking a hard line against anyone who would challenge it.
Economic freedom is one of a tyrant’s first targets. My family and I have experienced this firsthand. But tools like Bitcoin offer a lifeline for activists fighting repressive states.
Coartar la libertad económica es uno de los primeros objetivos de un tirano. Mi familia y yo hemos experimentado esto de primera mano. Sin embargo, herramientas como Bitcoin ofrecen una esperanza a los activistas que luchan contra los estados represivos.
The famed economist and Nobel laureate is charged with repairing what remains of Bangladesh’s democracy. But is someone even as accomplished as Yunus up to the task?
