Democracy continues its backsliding

Yet more evidence of autocracies on the rise.

Spoiler: International IDEA, The International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, relased its annual report some weeks ago. It provides gloomy reading as do the reports of its colleagues, V-Dem, Freedom House, Rule of Law Project, the Economist which also present annual analyses and indicators of democracy and freedom.

Democracy is losing the fight against autocracy for the sixth year in row. In all regions, although not every country in the regions. Europe is again the harbour of most democracies in the world. Yet, there are black holes also in Europe. Yes. Belarus and muscovy of course.

We need to stop this development. And the best way to do it is to defeat the little fascist in the kremlin. Not only defeat him but also prevent another little fascist in the future from rising to power and attacking muscovy’s. muscovy should not only be defeated but also deconstructed.

This year, IDEA does not present an overall indicator ranking democracy in countries. Instead, it ranks countries within each of four restructured categories of democratic performance: Representation, Rights, Rule of Law, and Participation. These are in turn aggregates of subcategories as shown below.

Source: International IDEA (2023). The Global State of Democracy 2023 The New Checks and Balances

Analysing developments for all the indicators, IDEA find that:

Across every region of the world, democracy has continued to contract, with declines in at least one indicator of democratic performance in half of the countries covered in the Report. Measured in terms of the areas of improvement and decline within each country, 2022 was the sixth consecutive year in which more countries experienced net declines in democratic processes than net improvements. This six-year pattern of decline is the longest of this kind since our records began in 1975. In short, democracy is still in trouble, stagnant at best, and declining in many places.

Autocracies are on the rise.

The largest deteriorations were found for Representation and Rule of Law where setbacks were noted in all regions, including different parts of Europe outside the two dictatorships. Dots belowe the diagonal represent countries where conditions of Rule of Law has declined between 2016 and 2022. Large improvements were made in Gambia and Maldives between these years. Conditions in Belarus, the blue point at (0.35, 0.20) are getting more and more similar to those in North Korea.

Source: International IDEA, The Global State of Democracy Indices, v7.1 2023.

But Belarus is not the only European country where conditions for Rule of Law worsened between 2016 and 2022. Largest setbacks were seen in Austria, Portugal and the Netherlands. The main reason for the backlash in Austria was increased corruption in the public sector. The decline in the Netherlands was due to falls in the predictable enforcement of laws while increased criminality caused less personal integrity and security in Portugal. Increased corruption and decresed judicial independence made things worse also in Norway even if its label has gone missing. It is the blue dot below Denmark. Increased corruption and less predictable laws led to declining Rule of Law in Sweden.

Source: International IDEA, The Global State of Democracy Indices, v7.1 2023.

Frequent readers of this blog may have noticed that I have covered this subject before. In March, I published this post.

In that post I used data and analyses by Freedom House and Varieties of Democracy. My conclusions were gloomy then and they are gloomier now. The report by Internatinal Idea did not improve my mood, on the contrary.

So, what I wrote then is true now. China, Iran, muscovy, and North Korea are threatening the freedom and lives of people in their own and other countries. Closer to home, the Polish election was a welcome positive development. But in the EU there are alos people like Orbán and Fico who abuse EU funds for their own uses and attack the media and kill journalists. Both of them try to block aid to Ukraine and appease the little bunker czar in the kremlin. And Trump is leading in the polls. ..

Defeat muscovy and make sure the fascists never rise again!

If we want to stop these developments, we need to show that we mean business. The best way to do this is to make sure that muscovy is defeated. Not only defeated for now but for the foreseeable future. We can not let another little fascist rise to power again and attack muscovy’s neighbouring countries.

In 2005, the UN adopted the principle Responsibility to Protect. We have all the evidence we need to intervene to stop muscovy’s genocide of Ukrainians. Since the dictatorships in the UN Security Council can veto any humanitarian action, we need to do it outside of the UN. NATO needs to intervene. Not only in Ukraine but also in muscovy. The little fascist in the kremlin and his accomplices must be arrested and charged with crimes against humanity.

To prevent that muscovy rises again, the country must be ruled by an alliance of democracies. The most important task of this alliance should be to divide muscovy into smaller entities and organise free elections in these new countries. Before this can take place, new institutions modeled on the institutions in democracies should be built. None of countries should be allowed to have any military forces. Their need defence against external threats should be met by the armed forces of the democracies.