New Forms of Democratic Citizenship in MENA
The Arab Spring opened a window of opportunity to revise democracy support in a direction that better reflects local interpretations of citizenship and rights, but external actors have yet to… Read more »
Category: Analysis
EU’s ‘resilience’ strategy challenges dichotomy of democracy or stability
The European Union’s new global strategy for foreign and security policy has devised a smart way forward to overcome the dichotomy between democracy and stability that has tended to bedevil the… Read more »
Democracies join authoritarians in rejecting civil society space
The United Nations Human Rights Council has passed a resolution for the “promotion, protection, and enjoyment of human rights on the internet” which condemns any country that intentionally disrupts the internet access of its… Read more »
‘A crime against humanity’ – Venezuela on the edge
It’s been almost two years now since the renowned Harvard economist Ricardo Hausmann caused a stir in his native Venezuela by posing an uncomfortable question, Bloomberg reports: Why does a… Read more »
Islamists threaten ‘fractious path’ of Pakistan’s democratic transition
Weeks of scathing criticism has apparently prompted a provincial government in Pakistan to review a grant of $3 million it has recently allocated for a controversial Islamic seminary, which some… Read more »
‘Unholy Alliance’? Kleptocratic Authoritarians and Western Enablers
It is widely understood that corruption is a pervasive problem in many societies and undermines public confidence in the political system and government institutions, argues Carl Gershman, President of… Read more »
Brexit advances Russia’s strategic aims
Vladimir Putin appeared to throw down the gauntlet to British politicians to quit the European Union yesterday, questioning whether they would dare to deliver on the democratic mandate for Brexit… Read more »
Why China is the big winner from Brexit
Publicly, China has lamented Britain’s decision to walk out on the EU. But there was a definite silver lining for Xi Jinping’s increasingly authoritarian China, “[and] it won’t have taken… Read more »
Brexit is a ‘warning to the liberal international order’
The British people’s decision to leave the European Union is the country’s single biggest democratic act in modern times, notes commentator Andrew Marr – and one of the elite’s most… Read more »
Putin’s ‘prelude to a purge’?
The arrest on June 24th of Nikita Belykh (above), the liberal-minded governor of the Kirovsk region, was headline news on Russian state television. It even preceded the report on… Read more »