Democracies in Trouble

The organization Freedom House notes that the world has experienced 16 years of democratic decline.  Last year it reported:  “The countries experiencing deterioration outnumbered those with improvements by the largest margin recorded since the negative trend began in 2006.  The long democratic recession is deepening”

Now many democracies appear less stable than in the recent past, and many authoritarian regimes appear more stable.  The U.S. for example, has moved toward polarization and dysfunction.  Authoritarian regimes, on the other hand, have all kinds of new technological tools to keep their population in check and under surveillance.  

See David Brooks, “The Culture Wars Have Gone Global,” New York Times, (April 120, 2022), pp. SR4, 5.