In first, US added to annual list of ‘backsliding’ democracies
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The United States has been added to an annual list of “backsliding” democracies for the first time, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance NGO has said, pointing to a “visible deterioration” that began in 2019.
The Stockholm-based organisation makes its annual assessment using 50 years of democratic indicators. It places about 160 countries into three categories: democracies, including “backsliding” democracies; “hybrid” governments; and authoritarian regimes.
Globally, the report said more than one in four people live in a “backsliding” democracy, while two-thirds of the world live in either a “backsliding” democracy, “hybrid” or authoritarian regimes.
“This year we coded the United States as backsliding for the first time, but our data suggest that the backsliding episode began at least in 2019,” said the report, titled: Global State of Democracy 2021.
“A historic turning point came in 2020-21 when former president Donald Trump questioned the legitimacy of the 2020 election results in the United States,” the report said, referring to a campaign by the former president and his allies to overturn the 2020 US election results, which culminated in Trump’s supporters storming the seat of the US legislature on January 6.
The report also cited growing polarisation in the US, as well as state voting laws “disproportionately affecting minorities in a negative way”.
IDEA Secretary-General Kevin Casas-Zamora called the “visible deterioration of democracy” in the US “one of the most concerning developments” in the 2021 report, according to the AFP news agency.
He warned of a knock-on effect, noting: “The violent contestation of the 2020 election without any evidence of fraud has been replicated, in different ways, in places as diverse as Myanmar, Peru and Israel.”
Global backslide
The report said the number of backsliding democracies in the world had doubled in the past decade.
In addition to “established democracies” such as the US, the list includes European Union member states Hungary, Poland, and Slovenia.
Two countries that were on the list last year – Ukraine and North Macedonia – were removed this year after their situations improved.
Meanwhile, Turkey, Nicaragua, Serbia, Poland, and Brazil were rated as having the most significant democratic declines over the last decade.
The report says in 2020 there were 98 democracies in the world, 20 “hybrid” governments, including Russia, Morocco, and Turkey, and 47 authoritarian regimes, which include China, Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia, and Iran.
The trend towards democratic erosion has “become more acute and worrying” since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the report added.
“Some countries, particularly Hungary, India, the Philippines and the USA, have [imposed] measures that amount to democratic violations – that is, measures that were disproportionate, illegal, indefinite or unconnected to the nature of the emergency,” it said.
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Ensuing comments should prove telling.
The full report can be found at:
Which imposed measures? COVID measures such as mask and vaccine mandates, quarantines?
More than likely measures taken that directly effect the democratic process. In the US, most likely, measures to restrict a citizen's ability to vote.
Exactly.
Ah. That makes more sense
The frustrating part is that if America where not a democratic nation, we wouldn't have to worry about COVID because vaccines would have been mandated for every citizen. Since we cannot do that, we have about 1/3 of our citizens dragging the rest of the country into additional COVID waves, mask requirements, and another deadly winter.
What specific measures are you talking about?
Not going to play that game with you Texan1211. Pick up a newspaper, magazine, or any other news source outside your right wing fantasy land, and find out for yourself.
You have a legitimate question, I will answer it.
If you just try to continue trolling and I will respond with silence.
Not a game, a legitimate question that seemingly no one can answer truthfully.
A legitimate question, no need to get huffy because you are unable to answer it.
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The backsliding has accelerated because of Biden's bizarre blunders
Derangement Syndrome never sleeps as it works its way through the alphabet.
That’s for darn sure!
Of course they left out 2016 election when the left questioned the results; and Democrats worked continuously to remove Trump from office at all costs from then on.
Guess that is their idea of a stable Democracy./S
But Clinton didn't spend the rest of 2016 and the next 4 years questioning the election results, did she?
Please summarize. WP is behind a pay wall and I can't access it. So your comment is basically worthless....in more ways than one because I have a sneakiing suspicion you really didn't read my comment
Basically the article is about a 2019 CBS interview in which she was asked a question and she answered. How this absolves Trump who didn't wait for questions to run the 2020 election into the ground both before and after is partisan poutrage porridge.
Oh... That was Trump's mistake. He only needed to wait to be asked a question.
thank-you. LIke I thought...his comment had no value
One of many he made, his only 'genius' was in being a carnival barker.
And the left and Democrats claim that Trump was the only one trying to overturn an election.
Who else has tried to overturn an election? And how did they try to do that?
Hmmm ... The United States is a backsliding democracy because Trump unsuccessfully challenged the 2020 election? No, that oversimplification is little more than a deliberate lie.
The increasing distrust in liberal democracy is coming from the political left. The political left is attempting to intimidate and coerce government institutions and the independence of the courts with threats of violence. The political left is attempting to circumvent the election process by displacing governance with partisanship. The political left is sowing distrust in government policy that does not conform to their specific political ideology. The political left is actively undermining our national charter of the Constitution.
Obviously the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance has selected criteria for measuring the extent of liberal democracy that ignores the actions of the political left. The reality is that the political left distrusts liberal democracy and are attempting to establish illiberal democracy. The United States isn't backsliding; the United States is being deliberately pushed towards illiberal democracy by the political left.
"Obviously" dust bunnies are real creatures in your mind.
Obviously.
Wow. Way to ignore everything that has happened and place the blame elsewhere....
Ignoring the nationwide protests against a jury deliberation and a criminal verdict isn't strengthening liberal democracy. Those protests are about distrust in an independent judiciary and distrust in liberal democracy.
The political left is using Trump's unsuccessful challenge to the 2020 election as a distraction. When the political left makes illiberal demands they point fingers at Trump to hide what they are doing. Our democratic institutions are being threatened by the political left; not by Trump.
What a load of crap.
Donald has done more to undermine elections and our country than anyone I remember in my lifetime, and you brush it off and still blame others.
How?
Joe Biden really is the 46th President.
....
The fact that Joe Biden really is the 46th President leaves one speechless? That's interesting in and of itself.
Everyone is ignoring some rather stark contrasts.
Trump blamed a 'rigged' election process for his loss. Clinton blamed the voters for her loss.
The 2020 election was a repudiation of Trump's character and not an endorsement of Democrat's political agenda.
Trump's MAGA politics was about defining who we are as a nation and protecting our right to exist as a nation. Biden's politics was about defining who we are as a people and advocating conformity to social ideals.
Here's the big question. Is liberal democracy an institutional model - or - is liberal democracy a social model? Is liberal democracy about who we are as a nation - or - who we are as a people?
What left me speechless was not understand what you are actually talking about.
If maga politics was defining who we are as a nation, we are fucked up, because the maga people are insane and believe conspiracy theories...
And what is wrong with 'social ideals'?
What I'm talking about is the democratic institutions worked as they were intended. Joe Biden really is the 46th President.
For some it seems confusing - but - political pundits and political party officials do not represent the institutions of democracy.
Ah, but that depends upon the hair-on-fire fear over backsliding democracy not being a conspiracy theory. Remember that Joe Biden really is the 46th President and Trump can't be blamed for democracy working as it was intended.
What's wrong with protecting our right to exist as a nation?
Donald can be blamed for what he has and still is doing. I see it every day the hold he has on people. The people that defend him with one breath then say they don't like him the next.
If you think donald was about protecting the nation, I have a bridge for sale. He is in it for him and nothing else.
Still trying to change the subject, eh?
Democrats have been throwing around their own conspiracy theories while claiming they are defending democracy. But that avoids answering the big question. Is democracy an institutional model - or - is democracy a social model?
Tribal democracy only represents the members of the tribe. Partisan democracy only represents partisans. Democrat's democracy only represents Democrats. So, who are we as a people?
You are a convenient abstraction, a ghost in the fog machine.
Abstractions like unified diversity or inclusive individuality or enforced freedom? How is democracy as a social model supposed to work? Who are we as a people?
The seeded article is claiming that the United States is backsliding on democracy. What does that mean?
You have often claimed the very same.
This is two things: 1) Growing polarization, and 2) State voting laws.
First, Growing polarization: I don’t love the polarization, either, but so what? There is no argument made here that growing polarization somehow diminishes democracy. Why would it? The rules have not changed just because there is polarization. Majority still rules, tempered by constitutional and judicial protections of the minority. Just because you declare that a thing is a problem, that doesn’t make it so.
It seems the idea here is that democracy increases where we all agree. Sorry, but that sounds more like Communism than Democracy.
Second, State voting laws that “ disproportionately affecting minorities in a negative way.” I call BULLSHIT. No evidence is presented that state voting laws have affected anyone disproportionately. It’s just a thing people say, and you’re expected to agree without supporting evidence or argument.
In fact, in recent months, more and more Democrats have come around to accept Voter ID proposals because it has become increasingly obvious to everyone that such rules don’t disproportionally impact any particular group. Furthermore, claiming they do smacks of racism.
Hear, hear! I have often asked what is explicitly racist or suppressing about any voting laws, and have YET to receive a sane answer or even one attempted.
You know, about how Georgia and their election law is so much more restrictive than the laws in Delaware and Colorado…
Well we do have that awesome example of freedom, the vote, and democracy over in the People’s Republic of China to try to live up to!