January 2021, Volume 32, Issue 1
The return to power, via elections, of the Rajapaksa family signals the consolidation of a Sinhalese Buddhist ethnocracy. But there are reasons to hope it will not take a turn toward full despotism.
January 2021, Volume 32, Issue 1
India’s Constitution has long seemed stable, but the rise of an ethnic, absolute, and opaque state is changing the constitutional order in momentous and disturbing ways.
January 2021, Volume 32, Issue 1
The alleged tradeoff between economic development and political democracy-building is more fiction than fact. Indeed, progress toward fuller democratic governance can in fact enhance development.
January 2021, Volume 32, Issue 1
A decade ago, Arab peoples stood up and sought to replace their rulers with a more democratic political project. But Arab autocrats have a project of their own. Can the people gain ground in the struggle for self-government, or will their rulers bear it away?
January 2021, Volume 32, Issue 1
A review of The Tyranny of Merit: What’s Become of the Common Good? by Michael J. Sandel.
January 2021, Volume 32, Issue 1
A review of Kleptopia: How Dirty Money Is Conquering the World, by Tom Burgis.
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 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
Universities, publishers, and other knowledge-sector institutions face increasingly sophisticated authoritarian efforts to quash critics and subvert independent inquiry.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
Through greater savvy engagement with international law, authoritarians are seeking not only to shield themselves from criticism, but to reshape global norms in their favor.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
The People’s Republic of China uses massive amounts of propaganda to influence how it is perceived beyond its borders. “Big data” reveal how that image is carefully and deliberately shaped for different audiences in different places.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
The Editors’ introduction to “Covid vs. Democracy.”
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
By highlighting the deficiencies of authoritarian-populist president Jair Bolsonaro’s rule, the covid-19 pandemic is likely to leave Brazil’s democracy intact but even more brittle.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
India’s covid-19 response has accelerated the country’s slide toward competitive authoritarian rule by centralizing decision making, undermining federalism, and providing new pretexts for stifling dissent.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
South Africa’s government sought to heed expert advice with its covid lockdown, yet shortcomings in state capacity fatally undermined both the virus response and efforts to address its devastating economic toll.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
Liberty flourished in Hong Kong, but the Chinese Communist Party has crushed it. Beijing wants “capitalism without freedom” in the city, but can there be one without the other?
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
Despite impressive achievements in socioeconomic development, Bangladesh has struggled with establishing democracy and is now effectively under one-party rule.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
When asked by presidents to intervene domestically for crime-fighting or civil-order purposes, Latin American militaries face a number of risks and have a degree of freedom to tailor their responses accordingly.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
Hyperlocalized U.S. policing both upholds and corrodes democratic principles. Although some aspects of Europe’s model are nonstarters in the United States, Americans crave centralized enforcement of rules against abusive policing.
October 2020, Volume 31, Issue 4
A review of Hidden Hand: Exposing How the Chinese Communist Party Is Reshaping the World, by Clive Hamilton and Mareike Ohlberg.
