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The coinciding tenure from 2017 to 2021 of ANO 2011 leader Andrej Babiš and his ally, President Miloš Zeman, has been described by analysts Sean Hanley and Milada Anna Vachudova as a period of democratic backsliding, albeit to a less drastic degree than Poland or Hungary.[5] However, other academics such as Elisabeth Bakke and Nick Sitter have disputed this, describing it as "conceptual stretching" and claiming that "exceptional factors" that existed in Hungary and Poland are not applicable to the Czech Republic.[6]
France
The legislative elections held in France on 30 June and 7 July 2024 resulted in the victory of the left-wing coalition group NFP. Despite the result, Emmanuel Macron decided to nominate as Prime minister Michel Barnier. Michel Barnier belongs to the republicans party or LR which came 4th in the electoral race with 46 seats,[7] far behind the 182 seats obtained by the Nouveau Front Populaire.
Macron decided not to respect the French political traditions which consists in nominating a prime minister who belongs to the party that has the most seats in the national assembly, which is considered by political analysts as the fair thing to do in a democracy. Nevertheless, Macron bypassed that tacit rule by pretexting France could not afford a left-wing party in government. In that regard, the legislative elections were seen by many as a mockery of the democratic process and especially by all the people who supported the left political party during the elections, many of whom went as far as to vote for the party of Emmanuel Macron at the second turn of elections in order to avoid having the nationalist party of Marine Le Pen taking control of Parliament.
Furthermore, Emmanuel Macron's governement has been using 49.3[8] quite regularly in Parliament to pass unpopular laws. The 49.3 is an element of the French constitution which allows the government to forcefully pass a law by bypassing the votes in the national assembly. Therefore, if a law is rejected by the parliamentary vote, the government can use 49.3 to impose the law all the same. Emmanuel Macron's governement has implemented numerous unpopular laws using the 49.3. It is yet another example of France's backsliding from democratic practices since 49.3 is seen in essence as an autocratic way of ruling.
Iulia-Sabina Joja of the Middle East Institute has disputed allegations of democratic backsliding against the Georgian government, stating that "Georgia has fared well over the last eight years and GD has stayed on the path of democratization and reform" and drawing attention to Georgian improvements on corruption perception and press freedom indices.[12]
In 2023, Georgian Dream proposed the "Law on Transparency of Foreign Influence", which would require non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to register as foreign agents or "organizations carrying the interests of a foreign power" and disclose the sources of their income. This was described as democratic backsliding by the Council on Foreign Relations and led to the 2023–2024 Georgian protests.[13]
Since 2010, Hungary under Viktor Orbán and his right-wing Fidesz party has been described as a prominent example of democratic backsliding.[15][16][17][18] As in Poland, political interference by the legislative and executive branches of government threatens the institutional independence of the judiciary.[19] In 2012, the legislature abruptly lowered the age of retirement for judges from 70 to 62, forcing 57 experienced court leaders (including the President of the Supreme Court) to retire.[20] After the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled that this decision violated EU laws relating to equality in the employment context, the government repealed the law and compensated the judges, but did not reinstate those forced to retire.[19][21][22][23] The 2012 judiciary reform also centralized administration of the courts under the newly established National Judiciary Office, then headed by Tünde Handó (a lawyer married to a prominent member of Fidesz).[19][20] Under Handó, the NJO also weakened the institutions of judicial self-governance, provoking what the European Association of Judges, Amnesty International, and the Hungarian Helsinki Committee describe as a "constitutional crisis" within the Hungarian judiciary.[24] Hungarian judges interviewed by Amnesty International also expressed concerns about attacks on the judiciary and individual judges by politicians and in the media.[19] The Hungarian government has dismissed criticism of its record on democracy issues.[25][26]
According to the 2020 report of the V-Dem Institute at the University of Gothenburg, Hungary had by 2019 become the first-ever EU member state to become an authoritarian regime.[27] On Freedom House's annual report, Hungary's democracy rating dropped for ten consecutive years.[28] Its classification was downgraded from "democracy" to "transitional or hybrid regime" in 2020; Hungary was also the first EU member state to be labeled "partially free" (in 2019). The organization's 2020 report states that "Orbán's government in Hungary has similarly dropped any pretense of respecting democratic institutions".[29][30] A 2018 article published in the Journal of Democracy also described Hungary as a hybrid regime.[28] Recently Hungary also backslid in its view regarding LGBT rights in Hungary, creating a bill similar to the Section 28 bill.[31]
In July 2021, leaked data acquired by the Pegasus Project suggested the Hungarian government may have used NSO Group's Pegasus spyware to target opposition journalists.[32] Hungarian officials acknowledged that they had purchased the spyware, but noted that they had received permission from either the courts or the Ministry of Justice in every case it was used.[33]
Macedonian Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski's VMRO-DPMNE government, which was in power from 2006 to 2016, has been described as engaging in democratic backsliding.[37] In 2015, Gruevski's Interior Minister and intelligence chief resigned after a scandal in which it was found the Macedonian government had wiretapped media outlets, the judiciary, prosecutors and political opponents.[38] Following Gruevski's departure from office as part of the Pržino Agreement, On 23 May 2018, Gruevski was sentenced to two years in prison for unlawfully influencing government officials in the purchase of a luxury bulletproof car.[39] He subsequently fled the country and was granted political asylum in Hungary.[40]
In the Polish case, the European Commission stated in December 2017 that in the two preceding years, the Parliament of Poland had adopted "13 laws affecting the entire structure of the justice system in Poland" with the "common pattern [that] the executive and legislative branches [were] systematically enabled to politically interfere in the composition, powers, administration, and functioning of the judicial branch."[41] In February 2020, Věra Jourová, Vice President of the European Commission for Values and Transparency, described the disciplining of judges in Poland as "no longer a targeted intervention against individual black sheep, similar to other EU member states, but a case of carpet bombing. ... This is no reform, it's destruction."[42] In late September 2020, 38 European and other law professors called on the President of the European Commission to take action in Poland, stating:
Polish authorities continue to openly abuse, harass and intimidate judges and prosecutors who are seeking to defend the rule of law. In addition, Polish authorities continue to openly defy the authority of the Court of Justice by refusing to follow its judgments. ... judges who are attempting to apply EU law are being threatened and punished while those who flaunt violations of EU law are being rewarded. ... The rule of law in Poland is not merely being attacked. It is being destroyed in plain sight.[43]
Ponta was accused of restricting voting among the Romanian diaspora in the 2014 Romanian presidential election, during which Ponta was running as the PSD presidential candidate.[48] Following the election, which Ponta lost, his close ally, Sebastian Ghiță, was indicted for offering illegal incentives to Moldovans with Romanian citizenship to vote for Ponta.[49] Ghiță subsequently fled the country for Serbia, due to his good relationship with Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić.[50] Ponta also left Romania for Serbia from 2016 to 2018, receiving Serbian citizenship and serving as an advisor to Vučic.[51]
In 2017, PSD Prime Minister Sorin Grindeanu's government passed new legislation decriminalising misconduct by officials, which was condemned by President Klaus Iohannis as a "day of mourning for the rule of law" in Romania. The legislation led to the 2017 Romanian protests.[55]
In 2019, Romania indicted Laura Codruța Kövesi, the former chief prosecutor of the National Anticorruption Directorate, who was running for European Chief Prosecutor at the time, leading EU authorities to condemn Romania for backsliding on the rule of law. Critics claimed that Romania's indictment of Kövesi was motivated by her indictment of numerous politicians, including Dragnea, on corruption charges.[56] Ponta, who had then become an opponent of Dragnea and the Romanian government after leaving the PSD, criticized the decision and described the PSD as increasingly "Fidesz-like", referring to the Hungarian ruling party.[57]
Under Putin's leadership, Russia has turned into an authoritarian state.
Under over two decades of Vladimir Putin's leadership, the Russian Federation has experienced major democratic backsliding. Putin became acting President of Russia with the resignation of Boris Yeltsin in 1999, and then full President in the 2000 Russian presidential election, and he was able to use "public and elite dissatisfaction with the instability of the 1990s" to consolidate power in his hands, while overseeing a decade of economic growth.[65] The centralization of power under Putin weakened the power of the Federal Assembly, and led to a return to more autocratic rule seen during the Soviet Union. In the late 1990s during the presidency of Boris Yeltsin, Freedom House gave Russia a score of 4 (out of 7; 1 meaning rights are fully protected, 7 meaning they are fully violated) for "freedom, civil liberties and political rights".[66]
Following subsequent de-democratization, experts do not generally consider Russia to be a democracy, citing purges and jailing of the regime's political opponents, curtailed press freedom, and the lack of free and fair elections. An example of the jailing of the regime's political opponents came most recently after the 2021 Russian protests when Alexei Navalny was arrested and sent to a penal colony and since then his Anti-Corruption Foundation has been deemed an extremist organization.[67] In 2021 more journalists and news outlets were declared foreign agents, with Russian TV channel Dozhd added to that list.[68] The Freedom House then in 2021 gave Russia a score of 20/100 and described it as not free. After serving 17 years as president, Putin, in 2021, signed a law allowing him to run in two more elections, potentially keeping him in power until 2036[69] with the 2020 amendments to the Constitution of Russia, leaving little constraint on his power.[65] Putin's 2012 "foreign agents law" targeted NGOs and furthered the crackdown on internal dissent.[65]
Scholars differ in their perspectives on the significance of post-1998 democratic backsliding in Russia under Putin.[70] Some view Russia's 1990s-era trend toward European-style democratization as fundamentally an ephemeral aberration, with Russia's subsequent democratic backsliding representing a return to its "natural" historical course.[70] The opposite perspective is that the democratic decline under Putin would be a relatively short-term episode in Russian history: "From this perspective, Russia after 1991 was back on the path to Europe after the seventy-year interruption represented by communism", and "that path was inevitably to be bumpy and subject to setbacks."[70]
Serbia
Freedom House's annual Nations in Transit report in 2020 reported that, due to democratic backsliding, Serbia was no longer a democracy but had instead become a hybrid regime (in the "gray zone" between "democracies and pure autocracies").[71][34] The report cited "years of increasing state capture, abuse of power, and strongman tactics employed" by Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić.[34]
The tenure of Vladimír Mečiar as Slovak Prime Minister and President in the 1990s after the dissolution of Czechoslovakia has been described by political scientists Elisabeth Bakke and Nick Sitter as a period of democratic backsliding, due to Mečiar's control over state media and centralisation of executive power.[76]
Widespread protests in 2018 following the murder of Ján Kuciak have been described by some scholars as "helping to stave off democratic backsliding" by causing the resignation of Robert Fico, who served as Prime Minister from 2006 to 2010 and 2012 to 2018.[77] However, Bakke and Sitter have disputed allegations of democratic backsliding against Fico, noting that Fico often emphasized "his commitment to pluralistic democracy", which contrasted with the Polish and Hungarian leadership during that time period and Slovakia under Mečiar.[6]
Following Fico's 2023 return to power, he enacted judicial reforms, including the dissolution of the anti-corruption Special Prosecutor's Office, in what has been described as democratic backsliding.[78] This caused protests and prompted the European Parliament and the European Commission to express concerns about the state of rule of law in Slovakia.[79] Further protests ensued in 2024 after Fico's Culture Minister, Martina Šimkovičová of the nationalist Slovak National Party, dismissed the heads of two key Slovak cultural institutions, the Slovak National Gallery and the Slovak National Theatre, and dissolved the Slovak national broadcaster RTVS and replaced it with a new one, STVR.[80]
Slovenia
Prime Minister Janez Janša was criticised by Žiga Faktor of the EUROPEUM Institute for European Policy for overseeing democratic backsliding in Slovenia. Faktor claimed that Janša had aligned Slovenia closely with Hungary, denied journalists access to information during the COVID-19 pandemic, and had expanded his Slovenian Democratic Party's influence over the country's media with Hungarian financial support.[81]
Several Ukrainian governments have faced accusations of democratic backsliding.
Prior to the removal of President Viktor Yanukovych in the 2014 Ukrainian revolution, Ukraine was described by political scientist Eleanor Knott as experiencing democratic backsliding and "soft authoritarianism".[83]
The Atlantic Council's Maxim Eristavi claimed in 2017 that "Ukrainian democracy is in danger" following President Petro Poroshenko's attempts to arrest his former ally and opposition figure Mikheil Saakashvili, and calls by Poroshenko's party for criminal investigations into another political opponent, Yulia Tymoshenko.[84]
Under the rule of Nikol Pashinyan, large-scale measures against political dissents, human rights activists, and journalists increased. Pashinyan began persecuting members of the previous cabinet on politically motivated charges, such as two former defense ministers Seyran Ohanyan (for embezzlement) and David Tonoyan (as part of an investigation to the supplying of an outdated missile to the Armed Forces of Armenia).
The democratic backsliding worsened especially after the 2021 parliamentary election, after which the government continued to find "the enemies of the people". Media freedom remained restricted and arrests against journalists increased in 2022. The Armenian diaspora has been especially targeted, with authorities refusing to allow Mourad Papazian, a French chairman of a diaspora organization, into the country due to his involvement in anti-Pashinyan protests in Paris in July 2022. On August 1, two Dutch-Armenians, Massis Abrahamian and Suneh Abrahamian, also spoke out against the government and were designated persona non grata in Armenia.
Members of the opposition Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) have also been targeted. It was revealed in May 2022 that the Armenian government under Pashinyan unlawfully installed the Predator spyware against journalists, dissidents, and human rights activists and hacked devices of several opposition leaders
In January 2023, Artavazd Margaryan, head of the faction, was detained for 72 hours along with party activist Gerasim Vardanyan. Margaryan's lawyer mocked the detention as illegal. Film producer and opposition supporter Armen Grigorian was put in pre-trial custody despite committing no crimes and died in July 2022 as his immune system got worse.[90]
Bangladesh
Bangladesh has faced multiple episodes of democratic backsliding since its transition to parliamentary rule in 1991. At first, Bangladesh's democratization was very promising, with the media becoming freer and an independent judiciary being promised by all parties. However, the two main parties, the Bangladesh National Party and Awami League showed a lack of respect for democratic rules, undermining the legitimacy of elections by refusing election results. In late 1994, the opposition Awami League resigned from parliament, demanding for a caretaker government system to oversee elections. This change was refused by the incumbent BNP, which insisted that the AL adhere to the constitution.
The authoritarian behavior increased significantly in late 1995. While the opposition AL endorsed violence by their supporters, the incumbent BNP used heavy-handed measures to restrict civil liberties against the opposition. Although this ended with the BNP gaining complete control of the parliament in February 1996, a caretaker government was finally implemented, potentially paving the way for more peaceful transitions of power. However, an extremely concentrating "Prime Ministerial System" developed where the prime minister held several offices: the leader of the House, leader of the majority party in parliament, and chief of the party. Article 70 of the constitution also allowed the prime minister to revoke memberships of parliament members if they vote against party, or abstain from sitting or voting.
Violence by parties' supporters continued.
On 17 May 2004, an amendment to the constitution made the previous Chief Justice the head of the caretaker government and Bangladesh started to transition into a competitive authoritarian regime, where democratic institutions are viewed as exercising political authority but are violated by incumbents and elections become high-stakes events. During this system, corruption became institutionalized and anti-corruption mechanisms were used against the political opposition. In October 2006, when a new caretaker government was about to be appointed, the oppisition parties did not accept the immediate past Chief Justice and the president became the head of state. In the 2006–2008 Bangladeshi political crisis, the BNP tried to influence the 2007 election and activists violently demonstrated with much condoning from the political parties. The military intervened, but political pressure forced the military to host an election at the end of 2008, which was won by the Awami League.
After Sheikh Hasina won the 2008 election, Bangladesh began to backslide into an electoral authoritarian regime where the elections are uncompetitive and not free and fair. This process started with the 15th amendment to the constitution which removed the caretaker government for the AL to dominate. It removed uncertainty in election results, allowing unchecked electoral fraud. The removal of the caretaker government was based on a Supreme Court ruling in May 2011 which made the caretaker government system unconstitutional. The opposition criticized the removal of the caretaker government, boycotting the 2014
election. Because of the boycott, more than half of the parliament was elected unopposed and Bangladesh became a de facto one-party state even with the Bangladesh Jatiya Party declaring to be the official opposition. The 2018 election results only increased the AL coalition's dominance to 288 out of 300 seats, although opposition parties participated. The election was condemned as "farcical" and "transparently fraudulent" by international media.
In addition, the AL brought frivolous charges and court battles against the opposition, particularly against the BNP. While former Prime Minister and BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia had 36 cases filed against her and was sentenced to 5 years in prison in a graft case in February 2018, the courts dropped all cases against Hasina filed during the BNP government in May 2010. Freedom of expression has also declined significantly, with the Information and Communication Technology Act, 2006 allowing charges against people who publish material which is "false", "prejudicial to the state or person", and/or "hurt religious beliefs". However, there were no defined offenses until an amendment in 2013 defined a steep penalty at 14 years imprisonment and a fine of 10,000,000 (1 crore) taka, which has been used to legally and extralegally charge human rights defenders, journalists, newspapers, and editors. Another act restricting freedom of expression, the Digital Security Act, 2018 also criminalized many forms of legitimate freedom of expression and dissent.
Extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances, collectively termed as the "crossfire", increased. Furthermore, the AL tightened control over various institutions, especially onto the courts after 2014. The 16th amendment to the constitution allowed the parliament to impeach Supreme Court judges for incapability and misconduct, leading to the 21st Chief Justice of Bangladesh Surendra Kumar Sinha to resign and be exiled.[91]
Bangladesh's increasing autocratization was cited by political observers as a key factor behind the non-cooperation movement in 2024.[92][93][94][95][96] The movement successfully ousted Hasina, who resigned and fled to India in self-imposed exile.[97]
Cambodia
In July 1997, Hun Sen seized power after months of tension and a grenade attack against the FUNCINPEC party, tightening his grip on power ever since by cracking down on the opposition. 20 years later, another opposition party, the Cambodia National Rescue Party, was dissolved after it was expected to gain sufficient support to win over Hun Sen's Cambodian People's Party. Party leader Kem Sokha was charged with treason, and many other opposition leaders fled or were banned from politics. This caused the CPP to dominate the parliament. [98]
Vitit Muntarbhorn, who was appointed as the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Cambodia in 2021, warned that Cambodia had been backsliding since the 1991 Paris Peace Agreements, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic, during which the government cracked down criticism on its response by arresting hundreds of people and handing prison sentences of over 20 years under a draconian law.[99]
In 2020, the V-Dem Institute identified India as one of five severe cases of democratic backsliding, relating to disproportionate limitations being placed upon the role of the Parliament of India through measures responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. This, they asserted, may lead to an "increased danger of power abuse by the executive".[101] As of their Democracy Report 2021, V-Dem lists India as an electoral autocracy, with significant downward movement to a number of indicators.[102] According to V-Dem, "In general, the Modi-led government in India has used laws on sedition, defamation, and counterterrorism to silence critics. In addition, critics have also accused him of arresting rival politicians to combat his opposition. A major politician that was arrested for corruption under him was Chief Minister of DelhiArvind Kejriwal, a prominent opponent of Modi and the BJP"[103] In 2023, it referred to India as "one of the worst autocratisers in the last 10 years".[104]
Indian lawyer Gautam Bhatia asserts that the Indian government has taken advantage of "vaguely worded" legislative clauses, some of a "colonial vintage", to effectively bypass the "deliberative organ" (the legislature) in relation to COVID-19. Some of these laws, he further asserted, technically hold "formal statutory backing", making it more difficult for the legislature to oppose executive power.[106]
In its 2021 Democracy under Siege report, Freedom House downgraded India from "free" to "partly free", citing the response to the Citizenship Amendment Act protests.[109] In 2023, according to the Freedom in the World report by Freedom House, India was classified as a "partly free" country for the third consecutive year.[110][111]
Indonesia
There have been concerns of declining freedom of expression during the first term of the Joko Widodo administration, evidenced by the arrest, detainment, and imprisonment of many people for their social media activity being interpreted as an "insult" to the president.
On 10 June 2020, Human Rights Watch urged the Indonesian authorities to drop all charges against seven Papuan activists and students, who are on trial for their involvement in anti-racism protests in August 2019.[112] On 2 December 2019, four students along with the other 50 students, peacefully protested against the human rights abuses in Papua and West Papua, asking the Indonesian government to release the Papuan political prisoners. A civil lawsuit was filed against 4 student activists following their expulsion from their university. On 13 July 2020, the police charged one of the four students with "treason" and "public provocation." Human Rights Watch urged the Indonesia's Khairun University to reinstate the four students who were expelled and support academic freedom and free expression.[113]
The Ministry of Communications and Information is often criticized for its censorship, as it blocks websites "to protect its citizen from hoax" [sic]. In 2020, the Director General Ministry Semuel Abrijani Pangerapan and Johnny G. Plate introduced a law that requires foreign companies to register under the Electronic System Operator list which could give the government access to the citizen's personal info and threaten the company to block access from the country if the company did not register. The law was revised and passed in 2021.[114] In July 2022, a ban was implemented for several notable websites such as PayPal, Epic Games, Steam, Origin, and Yahoo, and games such as Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Dota 2 as they did not register under the ministry's new law.[115][116][117]
Israeli legal scholar Aeyal Gross wrote that while Netanyahu's early premiership embraced a U.S.-style neoconservative approach, his later tenure "increasingly resembled the model of right wing populism with authoritarian tendencies" in the mode of Trump, Orbán, and Bolsonaro.[124] Yaniv Roznai of the Radzyner Law School at Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya wrote in 2018 that while Israel remained "a vibrant democracy with strong and effective judicial and democratic institutions", its liberal democracy was at risk from "incremental erosion of Israel's democratic institutions through countless initiatives to prevent antigovernment criticism, to weaken the judiciary, to infringe minority rights, and to modify the democratic rules of the game."[119] Various scholars and commentators have cited as examples of democratic risks in Israel the "rise of ethno-nationalist populism"'[120] the passage of the Nation-State Law;[121][123][124] the use of nativist and exclusionary rhetoric by Netanyahu and his cabinet ministers;[123][120][124] including comments during the 2015 election campaign delegitimizing Arab Israeli voters[119][123] and comments labeling opponents and left-wing critics as traitors and tools of outside forces;[120] proposals to change Israeli law to modify the status of (or unilaterally annex) the West Bank;[119][121] Netanyahu's effort to grant himself immunity from prosecution on charges of corruption;[121] legislative proposals to limit the powers and independence of the Israeli Supreme Court, including the scope of its judicial review competence;[119] overtly racist or fear-mongering campaign advertisements by some parties of the populist right;[120] and efforts to exert greater control over the media[119][121] and NGOs.[121] In a 2019 report, Tamara Cofman Wittes and Yael Mizrahi-Arnaud of the Brookings Institution argue that Israeli politics has "sources of resilience" that offer "pathways away from illiberal populism" including structural features of the Israeli political system (such as norms of liberal democracy and a fragmented parliamentary system that leads to competing populist parties) and cultural features of the Israeli society (such as a burgeoning women's movement that spans "secular-religious, Ashkenazi-Mizrachi, and Jewish-Arab divides").[120]
In 2019 and 2020, four national elections were held. The first three resulted in a tie, essentially deadlocking between pro- and anti-Netanyahu forces. The March 2021 election resulted in Netanyahu's ouster and the formation of a broad-based coalition government consisting of right-wing anti-Netanyahu parties, centrist, center-left, left-wing, and Arab parties.[124] Scholars discussed whether the change in power would mark the end of democratic backsliding that had occurred under Netanyahu.[124][125]
After the collapse of the Bennet-Lapid government, Netanyahu was inaugurated again as Prime Minister and formed a new government which is considered to be the most far-right, ultra-nationalist, religiously conservative government in Israel's history. Netanyahu's government unveiled plans to weaken the judicial system, including overriding Supreme Court decisions with a simple 61-vote majority of the Knesset and changing the structure of the Judicial Selection Committee by adding more politicians. The ultranationalist Itamar Ben-Gvir, who was also previously convicted of supporting a terrorist group known as Kach, which espoused Kahanism and anti-Arabism, was appointed Minister of National Security after changing the law, giving Ben-Gvir unprecedented power over the police.
Japan
Some scholars consider Japan to have experienced mild democratic backsliding under the rule of Shinzo Abe,[126][127] but on the other hand, many institutions such as the Brookings Institution and Chatham House consider Japan has been one of the most successful and stable democracies in an area of populist turbulence.[128][129] In 2024 Japan was upgraded from "narrowed" to "open" in the CIVICUS monitor report due to its efforts to protect freedom of assembly and association, notwithstanding the State Secrecy Law.[130]
According to the Leiden Asia Centre, in the lead-up to the 2020 Summer Olympics, Japan had been backsliding under Shinzo Abe due to increasing government surveillance capabilities in the name of making Japan "the safest in the world". It started in 2013 through the creation of the Japan National Security Council and Counter Terrorism Unit Japan and the enactment of the State Secrecy Law in 2014 and Anti-Conspiracy Bill in 2017. These laws were passed without accountability and oversight and only surveilled the Japanese population with a lack of transparency. Despite the postponement of the games due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the government's policies did not change. The Security Coordination Centre (SCC), which was established in May 2020 as a watchdog for government surveillance, shut down due to the postponement of the Olympics, diminishing the oversight. Despite the increasing government surveillance, its efforts failed to prevent the assassination of Shinzo Abe and the attempted assassination of Fumio Kishida.
Japan's democratic backsliding allegations also coincided with its strengthening of security measures in order to better support the US and its blant disregard of human rights and democracy issues in Myanmar, specifically the Rohingya genocide and the 2021 coup d'état and the neglect of the needs and interests of ethnic minorities. The Suga and Kishida administrations have largely continued the lines of Abe, continuing to support his policies.[131]
Abe's constant interference and intimidation of media outlets, incomplete coverage of the Fukushima nuclear accident, and the State Secrets Law increased self-censorship, and they were cited as the major reasons why Japan fell to 72nd place on the Press Freedom Index in 2016, in contrast to its previous 11th-place ranking from six years prior. In addition to that, his conservative friend Katsuto Momii became the Director-General of NHK on December 20, 2013, compromising the NHK's independence by publicly stating that NHK should not deviate from the government's position, members of Abe's Liberal Democratic Party urged the government to punish media outlets critical of it, and the removal of three television presenters Ichiro Furutachi, Hiroko Kuniya, and Shigetada Kishii from their positions for being critical of his administration.[132] As of 2024, Japan is ranked 70th in the Press Freedom Index and remained the lowest in the G7.
However,
However, whether or not had press freedom declined in Japan remains heavily contested, especially among Japanese. While Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan member Ichirō Ozawa went as far to concern that Japan has experienced "incredible democratic backsliding" due to the erosion of press freedoms, several X users voiced their suspicions about the decline, with some users noting that Japan's press freedom rating rising during the Democratic Party of Japan's rule was arbitrary. In fact, Furutachi remarked on an episode of Yomiuri TV program Sokomadeitteiinkai NP that "after the Democratic Party came into power, we would get calls from ministers and politicians...They would ring up telling us to silence certain newscasters or demanding apologies...since the second Abe administration, the calls have completely stopped". Another user suspected that the sudden decline in Japan's press freedom ranking in 2013 was due to the recognition of kisha clubs in November 2012. Toshio Katsukawa, an associate professor at Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, opined that the issue of press freedom was more of an issue of press accountability, noting that "while exercising the freedom not to report inconvenient truths, the media resorts to fabrication and bias in condemning its targets".[133]
There is also disagreement on the prevalence of populism in Japan and its contribution to democratic backsliding. Journalist Takeshi Niinami noted that populism persists in Japanese society in the form of unsustainable government spending that caused mounting government debt and the Lost Decades from the 1990s.[134] Another view expressed by Bećirbegović Selim of the University of Sarajevo considers the dominant Liberal Democratic Party to be populist, while also noting that more populist parties appeared after the 2008 financial crisis and that the LDP under Shinzo Abe used populistic policies in their campaigns such as Abenomics in an October 2020 thesis.[135] Other scholars disagree and noted that particularly since the 2020s, Japan has remained politically stable compared to many European countries and the US, where populist political parties gained popularity. The lack of populism has been attributed to several factors including the party system which requires politicians to compromise on their views, its social safety nets being well-maintained, the prioritization of egalitarianism and cooperation, the lack of an urban-rural cultural divide, and less stigma towards immigration due to an aging population. Still, populism still persists somewhat at the local level, but it is significantly different from populism in G7 nations because it does not contribute to much political polarization.[136][137]
Kuwait
On May 10, 2024, Emir Mishal Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah suspended Kuwait's National Assembly, which was considered to be freely democratically elected by men and women. Although it could not appoint the Prime Minister or government leaders, it could pass legislation, investigate and remove cabinet ministers, reject the budget, and approve treaties.
Meshal suspended some of the constitution's provisions, stated that the National Assembly can be dissolved for at least 4 years, and claimed that the legislature was dissolved to improve Kuwait's economic and security situation, although thee were other problems outside of the gridlock between the Emir and the legislature. This decision was in line with Kuwaitis becoming more dissatisfied with democracy due to political gridlock.[138]
Under the rule of President Rodrigo Duterte, the Philippines has been described as undergoing democratic backsliding.[139]
David Timberman of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has argued that the Duterte government has "run roughshod over human rights, its political opponents, and the country's democratic institutions", citing intimidation of political opponents, institutions and the media, increased extrajudicial killings, and suggestions of implementing martial law.[140] Duterte has claimed to have looked to Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump as a role model to do more democratic backsliding.[140]
Democratic backsliding allegations first rose the Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye administrations from 2009 to 2015 due to decreasing executive constraints and illegal government surveillance of the opposition and journalists. After their administrations, in 2018, Lee was arrested for bribery and embezzlement,[144] while Park was impeached and then sentenced to 24 years in prison (later increased to 25 years) for corruption and abuse of power.[145]
During Moon Jae-in presidency after Park's impeachment, South Korea improved its ratings on democracy indices such as the V-Dem Democracy Indices, Freedom in the World, Democracy Index, and World Press Freedom Index.[146][147] However, Moon's presidency also had politically selective cases against foreign high-ranking officials Prosecutor General Yoon Suk-yeol and weakening judicial independence from the executive by allowing former prosecutors and judges to earn a position in the Blue House and for retired judges to run for and win seats in the National Assembly. The Democratic Party of Korea also tried to curb opposition power by enacting a new electoral system based on mixed-member proportional representation to increase the share of minority parties, which was responded with confrontations in April 2019 that ended in several legislators from both sides receiving charges.
In another case, the Democratic Party threatened to sue a professor for asking readers of a newspaper column she wrote to vote for any party except for the Democratic Party in the 2020 South Korean legislative election. Despite the Moon administration effectively containing COVID-19 in the early stages of the pandemic, the success was at the costs of widespread violations against the right to privacy by surveilling infected people and collecting and publishing their personal information.[148]
Under the Yoon Suk-yeol administration from May 2022, with politically motivated investigations against opposition figures (albeit targeting Moon-era personnel), intimidation against journalists for reporting on to him and his wife, heightening marginalization of communities that lack adequate legal protection such as the LGBTQ+ community, the suppression of strikers, and a lack of accountability from senior government officials. Despite declining use of laws against government critics, charges against individuals and organizations for breaching the National Security Act spiked in 2023, as part of a trend in conservative-leading presidencies.[149][150]
As of 2024, Sweden's V-Dem is claiming that South Korea autocratized based on their Liberal Democracy Index. As this was reported in South Korea, this word was introduced to South Korea.[151]
South Korea's ranking in World Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) fell sharply in May 2024 compared to 2023. It fell from 47th place to 62nd place, which was influenced by the excessive use of legal sanctions against media outlets that were critical of the government, such as MBC, and severe punishment for critical reporting.[152]
Turkey under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has experienced democratic backsliding.[153][154][155][156] Scholar Ozan Varol writes that Erdoğan engaged in a form of "stealth authoritarianism" that incrementally increased pressure on democratic institutions over time and eventually culminated in authoritarianism.[157] Although Erdoğan was originally viewed as a possible reformer, the Turkish government took a sharp authoritarian turn when it violently suppressed the Gezi Park protests in May 2013.[158] Increasing curbs on freedom of the press, freedom of expression, and freedom of assembly coincided with Erdoğan's purge of liberal and conciliatory figures from the Justice and Development Party (AKP).[158] A constitutional referendum in October 2007 changed the method of selection of the President of Turkey from election by the Grand National Assembly to direct election, marking a shift to a presidential system.[158] Erdoğan consolidated executives power through his re-election in 2014 and his subsequent dismissal of Ahmet Davutoğlu.[158] Following a failed coup attempt in 2016 (which Erdoğan blamed on the Hizmet movement of his former ally-turned-rival, Fethullah Gülen), Erdoğan declared a state of emergency; undertook a series of major purges targeting civil society and perceived political opponents, including those within the bureaucracy, police, judiciary, and academia, and prosecutors; and dismantled the rule of law.[158] A 2017 constitutional referendum formally adopted a presidential system and further aggrandized executive power.[158][157] The effect of the shifts, partly enabled by a weak and internally divided Turkish opposition,[158][157] was to transform Turkey into a hybrid regime.[154] In its 2018 annual report, Freedom House classified Turkey as "not free" (the first time the country has been classified as such by Freedom House, which began publishing annual reports in 1999).[158] A 2019 report from the European Commission identified Turkey as "seriously backsliding" on areas of human rights, the rule of law and economic policy.[159]
A contrary view holds that Turkey was never a democracy to begin with.[160][161]
Africa
Various countries in Africa have experienced democratic backsliding. Christopher Fomunyoh, a longtime Africa expert with the U.S.-based National Democratic Institute, said in 2020 testimony to the U.S. House of Representatives' Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health and Global Human Rights that there were strong democratic advances in Africa (especially West Africa) occurred between the late 1980s to the late 2010s, but that by 2019, democratic trends had reversed, with the result being "there are now fewer democracies in Africa" in 2021 than in 1991.[162] Fomunyoh noted that in the first 20 years of the 21st century, about a dozen countries in sub-Saharan Africa weakened or abolished constitutional term limits for presidents; these moves weakened constitutionalism to benefit incumbents, removed one method of facilitating "the peaceful and orderly renewal of political leadership" and led to "excessive fragmentation and polarization of the polity, and, in some cases outright violence, and the further shrinking of political space."[162]
Under the rule of Patrice Talon, Benin, which had been one of the most stable democracies in Africa, has faced severe democratic backsliding, especially after the 2019 parliamentary election, which suppressed the opposition by imposing last-minute registration requirements on parties by invalidating the candidacy of all parties except for pro-Talon parties Progressive Union and Republican Bloc. These required candidates to receive sponsorships from sitting officials, giving ruling parties veto over a candidate's ability to run for office. Security forces were granted amnesty despite using live ammunition on protesters responding to the parliamentary. In response to an African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights (ACHPR) order ruling that its constitutional revisions, antidemocratic actions, and the sponsorship system violate the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance, Benin simply withdrew from the ACHPR. In response to the authoritarian practices, the 2021 presidential election had low voting turnout at 26%, despite Talon claiming that the turnout was 50%. Furthermore, Talon denied that protests following the 2021 elections, which also had security forces using ammunition, killed any demonstrators, when in reality, the ammunition in these protests killed 2 people.
Talon's personal lawyer Joseph Djogbenou became the President of the Constitutional Court of Benin and has also been accused of authoritarian practices by using CRIET, a court to prosecute terrorism and economic crimes, to persecute opposition politicians such as Reckya Madougou, leader of Les Démocrates (the main opposition party in Benin), and Joël Aïvo, who boycotted the election. As a violation of freedom of expression, society members marching in front of the CRIET were arbitrarily arrested to signal "the end of impunity". As of April 2021, at least 400 people have been arrested for political charges during the democratic backsliding and many others have been exiled.
[163]
In contrast to the 2019 and 2021 elections, the 2023 parliamentary election was largely violence-free with Benin-based Civic Academy for Africa's Future head Expedit Ologou calling the elections "calm, peaceful, friendly, [and] fraternal in most areas of the country",[164] although Éric Houndété, leader of the LD opposition party, making claims of vote buying and ballot stuffing without providing evidence, saying "The Democrats party rejects this result, which does not reflect the will of the people to make our party the first political force in our country."[165] However, assaults against press freedom continued, particularly against coverage of the 2023 Nigerien coup d'état. Examples include a Nigerian environmental journalist investigating at Pendjari National Park being arrested on suspicion of being involved with a terrorist organization and the suspension of media outlet La Gazette du Golfe's services for condemning the Nigerien military coup. [166]
There have been concerns of democratic backsliding under the Nana Akufo-Addo administration, largely due to increasing attacks on protests. For example, a protest made by the opposition party National Democratic Congress on 6 July 2021 against rising insecurity was met with massive police brutality. [167] Amid the rising cost of living, hundreds of demonstrators protested against an economic crisis on 21 September 2023, in which 49 people were arrested. The government claims that the economic crisis was caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and Russian invasion of Ukraine, but many people have blamed it on corruption and economic mismanagement on expensive projects.[168][169]
Freedom of expression has also declined. Ghana fell from 30th to 60th on RSF's Worldwide Press Freedom Index in 2022 due to increasing cases of abuses on journalists. Examples of attacks include investigative journalist Manasseh Azure Awuni receiving multiple death threats and unsuccessful defamation suits,[170] an armed attack on local radio station Benya FM for covering sensitive subjects such as the government's mismanagement of the fishing industry, and New Patriotic Party (NPP) supports attacking a Ghana News Agency reporter, accusing him of being a National Democratic Congress member.[171]
Madagascar
Since its independence, Madagascar has faced political turbulence largely neglected by the international community, with many instances of leaders coming into power through undemocratic means.
Marc Ravalomanana, who ruled Madagascar from 2002 to 2009, was called out by Andry Rajoelina in 2008 for corruption, embezzlement, and authoritarian rule. The tension erupted into the 2009 Malagasy political crisis on January 26 where 135 protesters were killed by violent governmental responses. On March 16, 2009, after a failed referendum, Ravalomanana resigned after the seizure of the presidential palace and the central bank by the military, who gave power to Rajoelina. This isolated Madagascar through the suspension of financial aid and from the African Union and the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
Rajoelina did not submit his candidacy before the deadline for the 2013 general election and was thus succeeded by Hery Rajaonarimampianina in 2014, but he returned to power in 2019. Although it was recognized as democratic and his term seen as stable, it was criticized for electoral manipulation. There were also fears that Rajoelina would easily win the 2023 presidential election due to a weak opposition, his concentration of the media, army, and judiciary, and support from powerful businessmen.
Protests increased in the lead-up to the 2023 election, which ended in being marred by poor preparation and organization, fictitious votes and polling stations, issuing of identity documents to government supporters, and the harassment and spying of the opposition. The opposition also boycotted the election and left only Siteny Randrianasoloniaiko, accused of creating the facade of democratic proceeses for Rajoelina to compete. [172]
Mauritius
Mauritius has experienced moderate[173] democratic backsliding during the 2019 general election as well as thereafter during the COVID-19 pandemic. The V-Dem institute deemed Mauritius to be a major autocratizer in its 2021 Democracy report.[174]
In the recent aftermath following the 2019 general elections in Mauritius, anomalies were reported by the local press.[175] Examples of electoral irregularities include eligible voters absent from the registration rolls, unauthorized technology in polling centers, as well as strewn and misplaced marked ballots.[176]
In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the government under Prime Minister Pravind Jugnauth made numerous amendments to existing laws that could jeopardize accountability and transparency in parliament. The suspension of parliamentary sessions, ejection of members of the opposition party (including its leader) and the perceived bias of the parliamentary speaker increased in regularity during that time. In June 2020, the Vice Prime Minister Ivan Collendavelloo was removed from office[177] over allegations of corruption in the St Louis Gate scandal. The former attorney general Jayarama Valayden, who is often a voice of dissent against the serving government, was arrested in 2021 for organizing a rally which violated COVID-19 rules on public gatherings.[178] In reaction to unarmed protests against the government's handling of the Wakashio oil spill off the island's coast, the government dispatched an armed police force to deter public assembly.[179]
In reaction to the Independent Broadcasting Authority Bill, worries over the erosion of the freedom of expression and journalistic freedom were voiced.[180] The bill would enshrine in law the ability of judges to force journalists to divulge their sources. Simultaneously, prohibitive fines would be imposed on journalists as well as shortening media licensing from three years to one year while doubling its cost. Mauritius' Information and Communications Technologies Act (ICTA) also sparked controversy for its provision to tap into secure messages, facilitate arrest and imprisonment over online posts and messages deemed defamatory.[181][182]
Senegal
Senegal has experienced democratic backsliding under the rule of President Macky Sall, who delayed the 2024 presidential election.[183] Presidential candidate Ousmane Sonko was disqualified from the election, and on 31 May 2023, Sonko was sentenced to two years in prison for "corrupting youth"; the sentence prevented him from standing as the PASTEF candidate in the 2024 presidential election. Sonko's arrest and sentencing triggered protests in June throughout Senegal, which were responded by police firing tear gas. It was then followed by restrictions on social media and an Internet outage.[184] After a ruling of the Senegalese Constitutional Council[185] the presidential election was held on 24 March 2024.
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After democratizing in 2011 Tunisia was a competitive democracy for ten years. Following the election of Kais Saied as president, he began to backslide democratically. As Saied faced civil unrest against him, he executed a self-coup, dismissing his prime minister and dissolving parliament. Following his consolidation of power, he instituted a new constitution, limited the freedom of press, and began cracking down on Black Africans.
Zambia
Zambia experienced a peaceful transition of power from the one-party rule of the United National Independence Party by the Movement for Multi-Party Democracy in 1991 and its elections had remained competitive for several years, but since the 2011 Zambian general election, Zambia had faced democratic backsliding under Michael Sata and Edgar Lungu. Aid and debt relief from Western donors supported the civil society's ability to curb executive powers, but the PF government criticized the dependence on Western aid as "neocolonialist" and cracked down on civil society.
The democratic backsliding has been partly attributed to flaws in the 1991 constitution which only changed the system to a multiparty system from the 1973 one. In 2021, Hakainde Hichilema was elected as President, putting an end to democratic backsliding in Zambia.[186]
The 2016 presidential candidacy and presidency of Donald Trump prompted grave concerns among political scientists regarding accelerated democratic backsliding in the United States.[193][194] In a 2019 journal article, political scientists Robert C. Lieberman, Suzanne Mettler, and others wrote that Trump's presidency presented a threat to the American democratic order because it simultaneously brought together three specific trends—"polarizedtwo-party presidentialism; a polity fundamentally divided over membership and status in the political community, in ways structured by race and economic inequality; and the erosion of democratic norms"—for the first time in American history.[195] Lieberman noted that Donald Trump has "repeatedly challenged the very legitimacy of the basic mechanics and norms of the American electoral process, invoking the specter of mass voter fraud, encouraging voter suppression, selectively attacking the Electoral College, and even threatening to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power" and noted that "Never in the modern era has a presidential candidate threatened to lock up his opponent; castigated people so publicly and repeatedly on the basis of their country of origin, religion, sex, disability, or military service record; or operated with no evident regard for facts or truth."[195] In 2020, political scientists Alexander Cooley and Daniel Nexon, wrote that "the Trump administration has consistently de-emphasized the importance of human rights and democracy in its rhetoric and while adopting language and tropes similar to those of right-wing, illiberal movements."[196] Colley and Nexon cited Trump's praise of autocratic rulers, his echoing of ethno-nationalist rhetoric, his efforts to delegitimizejournalism and journalists as "fake news" and his policies erecting new barriers to refugees and asylum-seekers as similar to politics "found in backsliding regimes".[196]
The 2019 annual democracy report of the V-Dem Institute at the University of Gothenburg found that the U.S. under Trump was among the world's liberal democracies experiencing "democratic erosion" (but not full-scale "democratic breakdown"). The report cited an increase in "polarization of society and disrespect in public deliberations" as well as Trump's attacks on the media and opposition and attempts to contain the judiciary and the legislature.[198] The report concluded, however, that "American institutions appear to be withstanding these attempts to a significant degree", noting that Democrats had won a majority the House of Representatives in the 2018 midterm elections, which "seems to have reversed the trajectory of an increasingly unconstrained executive".[198] The V-Dem Institute's 2020 report found that the U.S. had "registered a substantial decline in liberal democracy" under Trump; the report also found that "the United States of America is the only country in Western Europe and North America suffering from substantial autocratization."[27]
According to a 2020 study in the American Political Science Review, Americans value democracy but are frequently willing to prioritize partisan political gains over democracy if the two are in conflict.[199] Scholars have identified U.S. federalism,[200][201] the urban-rural divide,[202] and the emergence of white identity politics[203] as key drivers behind democratic backsliding in the U.S.
In 2021 a Freedom House report rated the U.S. 83 out of 100, an 11-point drop from its rating of 94 out of 100 in 2011. Issues such as institutional racism in the United States in relation to criminal justice and voting rights, the negative influence of campaign finance which Freedom House views is damaging public trust in government, and increased political polarization in the United States due to the extreme use of partisan gerrymandering were cited as reasons for the decline in the United States' rating.[204]
In 2021 the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance added the United States to their list of backsliding democracies, pointing to Trump's attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, as well as state voting laws that disproportionately impact minority groups.[205]
El Salvador has been described as undergoing democratic backsliding after the election of President Nayib Bukele, particularly following the 2020 crisis, when Bukele sent Salvadoran Army soldiers into the Legislative Assembly to pressure and intimidate members of the Assembly.[206] In a June 2020 report, the V-Dem Institute wrote that El Salvador was "at high risk of pandemic backsliding" and that the country was one of several countries with "severe" violations of democratic standards of emergency measures, including: arbitrary mass arrests by security forces of persons deemed to violate social distancing rules (in contravention of a number of decisions of the Supreme Court).[101]
In September 2021, Bukele-appointed judges ruled that Bukele could run for a second term, despite El Salvador's constitutional prohibition on serving two consecutive terms in office.[208]
The U.S. chargé d' affaires ad interim to El Salvador, Jean Elizabeth Manes, has said that the actions of the Bukele government have led to deteriorating relations with the United States, stating, "We simply can't look away when there's a decline in democracy".[209]
In September 2022, Chilean President Gabriel Boric described an "authoritarian drift" in El Salvador which he warned was "undermining democracy" in the name of fighting crime.[210]
In May 2022, the United States government banned Guatemalan Attorney General María Consuelo Porras from the entering the U.S., with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken stating, "Attorney General Porras's corrupt acts undermine democracy in Guatemala".[212]
The Los Angeles Times has reported that there is "a growing wave of attacks on Guatemala's courts that have forced more than 20 judges and prosecutors into exile", with political analyst Edgar Gutiérrez accusing the Guatemalan government under President Alejandro Giammattei of "constructing an authoritarian state".[213]
The Organization of American States (OAS) was critical of the conduct of the 2017 Honduran general election, noting irregularities in its conduct and calling for fresh elections.[214] Following a decision by the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, the election was won by President Juan Orlando Hernández, who had run for a second term following the Honduran Supreme Court's decision to allow the President of the country to run for re-election. The tenure of Hernández and the National Party of Honduras has been described by Patricio Navia and Lucas Perelló as a period of democratic backsliding,[215] with Perelló claiming that Hernández and the National Party of Honduras had "dismantled democratic institutions" in Honduras.[216] Hernández has also been accused of "human rights violations" and "extrajudicial killings".[217]
Hernández also pursued close ties with Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, despite ideological differences between the right-wing Hernández and left-wing Ortega, opposing or abstaining on resolutions condemning Nicaraguan actions at the OAS.[218][219]
Hernández subsequently followed constitutional term limits and chose not to run for a third term, and the National Party lost the 2021 Honduran general election.[220]
Mexico
Shannon K. O'Neil, the vice president, deputy director of Studies, and Nelson and David Rockefeller senior fellow for Latin America Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, argued that Mexico was undergoing democratic backsliding under President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who has displayed little regard for democratic processes, lashed out against critical journalists and columnists, and harassed non-governmental organizations and civil society movements investigating corruption, supporting women's rights or defending human rights.
In addition to these threats, he undermined the power of independent agencies by cutting their budgets through the legislature. He also eliminated 109 state-controlled trust funds set up by past governments to safeguard dedicated public support for artists, academics, scientists, journalists and human rights defenders. In a violation of the constitution and fiscal code, Obrador revealed the personal income data of journalist Carlos Loret de Mola, who reported on his son's luxurious life in Houston. The judicial branch has been weaponized with politicized investigations, with threats to incarcerate several professors and scientists on money laundering and organized crime charges in the maximum-security prison Reclusorio Norte. Furthermore, environmentially damaging and mostly opaque infrastructure projects have increased, including the construction of the Dos Bocas oil refinery in Tabasco and the Tren Maya in the Yucatán Peninsula.[221]
As part of the USMCA Agreement, in July 2020, Mexico passed controversial amendments to its copyright law, causing serious human rights concerns from the National Commission of Human Rights. These amendments implemented a notice and take down system that forces internet service providers to remove any content or publication that has been accused of violating copyright, even without any evidence of the infringement or a judicial authority. This system could be considered as an extrajudicial form of censorship since it conditions ISPs to implement unilateral content removal measures. Circumvention of technological protection measures is also broadly, vaguely and imprecisely banned, even if the circumvention is done in exercise of human rights. The mere dissemination of instructions is also disproportionately punished.
As a result, human rights organization R3D challenged the constitutionality of the 2020 amendments to the copyright law in the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation.[222] However, the SCJN, in a 6-5 vote, upheld the controversial reforms because the law sanctions abusers of the instrument and provides a counter-notice system to restore the removed material. Still, a counter-notice is not automatic (in 15 business days) and even if it is restored, freedom of expression would already be damaged, especially in political contexts. R3D has described the decision as "favoring commercial interests without paying attention to the terrible implications that these reforms cause in freedom of expression, privacy, security, competition, the economy of consumers, technological autonomy and the environment, betraying its obligation as guarantor of human rights".[223]
Nicaragua
Nicaragua under President Daniel Ortega has been described by Lucas Perelló and Patricio Navia as undergoing democratic backsliding, leading Ortega's Sandinista National Liberation Front to have a "dominant status" in the country's politics.[224]Ortega has enacted changes that have reduced the capacity for Nicaraguans to make claims against the government.
After rising to power, Ortega ratified indefinite elections in 2014 that have now allowed Ortega to serve on his fourth consecutive term.[225] Although opposition parties rival him, Ortega has concentrated power by hosting elections that many deem as fraudulent and banning opposition party leaders from standing by the Nicaragua Supreme Court.[226][227] Following Ortega's 2021 election, the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom imposed sanctions on Nicaragua over the fraudulent election.[228]
Ortega has cracked down on civil society, where he motivated the military to use lethal violence on protestors in April 2018.[229] Prior to the 2021 Nicaraguan general election, Nicaragua jailed opposition figures and journalists under a new treason law.[230] In 2022, Ortega has intensified a crackdown on the Catholic Church by banning processions, arresting priests, and shutting down Catholic radio stations.[231]
The 2019 Bolivian political crisis, when the Bolivian Armed Forces compelled President Morales to resign, was described by Javier Corrales as "one of the few examples of democratic backsliding in which the government ends defeated".[233] However, other analysts, such as Robert Carlson, have noted that acting President Jeanine Áñez "repeatedly delayed elections after a tumultuous transfer of power", describing this an example of pandemic-era democratic backsliding.[234] Áñez and her ministers were later jailed on terrorism and sedition charges, which she described as a "political prosecution", with Human Rights Watch noting the arrest warrants "contain no evidence whatsoever that they have committed the crime of terrorism".[235]
Brazil
Political scientist Robert Muggah argued in Foreign Policy that Brazil was undergoing backsliding under President Jair Bolsonaro, noting Bolsonaro's criticisms of the judiciary and the electoral system, and his participation in anti-democratic rallies.[236] Bolsonaro has often used Rodrigo Duterte and Donald Trump as a model to effect democratic backsliding in Brazil.[236]
In July 2021, Bolsonaro threatened to cancel the 2022 Brazilian general election, claiming election fraud would take place unless the electoral system was reformed.[237]
In August 2021, Bolsonaro described "three alternatives for [his] future", which he said were "being arrested, killed or victory" in the 2022 election.[238]
Following his defeat in the 2022 election, Bolsonaro declined to concede, although he allowed a transition to take place to incoming President Lula da Silva.[239] The 2023 Brazilian Congress attack which followed was described as an instance of democratic backsliding.[240]
The Brazilian Supreme Court has also been accused of undemocratic actions. In 2019, magazine Crusoé published a report accusing the Supreme Court's president, Dias Toffoli, of being involved in the corruption scandal operation Car Wash. Toffoli granted the court a new power to launch an inquiry to investigate personal attacks and statements against court members, a move that was called as "act as an investigator, prosecutor and judge all at once in some cases" by the New York Times.[241]
Toffoli named justice Alexandre de Moraes as the inquiry instructor. Moraes ordered Crusoé to remove the article from their website, calling it "fake news". After being criticized by journalist organizations, and after being presented with legal documents that showed the article was accurate, he rescinded the order.[242]
According to the New York Times, since grating itself this new power, the country's Supreme Court, through justice Moraes, has ordered major social networks to remove dozens of accounts, erasing thousands of their posts, often without giving a reason. In seven cases, Moraes ordered the arrest of far-right activists on charges of threatening democracy by advocating for a coup or calling people to antidemocratic rallies. Some cases were initiated by the attorney general's office, while others Mr. Moraes began himself.[241]
With Moraes orders affecting right-wing activists and social media profiles, president Jair Bolsonaro attacked Moraes in speeches, tried and failed to get him impeached in Congress and told supporters during a rally he would not abide by Mr. Moraes's rulings, though he later walked back and apologized the next day.[243][244]
In 2022, Moraes assumed the presidency of the Supreme Elections Court, Brazil's court that oversees elections. The 2022 presidential elections saw unprecedented oversight over social media by the court. During the campaigns, the court had ordered the removal of at least 334 social media posts deemed "fake news", from platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Telegram, WhatsApp, TikTok, Kwai and Gettr.[245] In October, days before the presidential election run-off, the court prohibited a documentary about the presidential candidates by Brasil Paralelo from being released until after the election, by a 4 to 3 vote. In the dissent, justices called the decision censorship, while the concurrents, including Moraes himself, denied it.[246]
In 2020, a bill aimed at combating "fake news" and other forms of misinformation in social media, called Projeto de Lei 2630/2020, passed the Brazilian Senate. In 2023, the bill picked up again in Chamber of Deputies. Moraes supported the bill and asked the Senate president for changes to the bill.[247] Platforms like Google, Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Twitter and TikTok publicly spoke against the bill in an open letter and spoke against it to its users. Moraes ordered the platforms to remove their publications made to its users and subpoenaed them to testify about it.[248][249]
Peru has undergone significant democratic backsliding since 2011, when Ollanta Humala took power. The Congress of the Republic, which was back then controlled by the right-wing opposition, began to obstruct Humala's actions. As a result, Humala was essentially left powerless and led a very weak presidency.[250][251][252] When Pedro Pablo Kuczynski was elected in 2016, the right-wing Popular Force party and its allied Popular Alliance gained an absolute majority in Congress, with the two gaining a combined 78 seats in Congress out of 130. As a result, Kuczynski's actions were heavily obstructed by Congress, who censured his appointed cabinet and attempted to impeach him. Corruption was also rife during this period, shown in the pardon of Alberto Fujimori, which was done for political favors. After a vote buying scandal emerged in March 2018 amidst a second attempt to impeach Kuczynski, he resigned and was succeeded by his vice president, Martín Vizcarra.
Vizcarra led a more confrontational approach with Congress, and passed several anti-corruption reforms. In September 2019, he dissolved Congress and snap elections were held in January 2020 which led to Popular Force and the Popular Alliance to lose its absolute majority, however, the right-wing still held considerable power over the president.[253] As a result of a plummeting economy and the COVID-19 pandemic, Congress attempted to impeach him twice, and he was successfully removed after the second attempt in November 2020. Manuel Merino assumed the presidency under controversy for his handling the impeachment proceedings, as unrest broke out. Merino resigned after 5 days in power and was replaced with Francisco Sagasti, who also faced tensions with Congress.
The problem of democratic backsliding arose sharply during the 2021 Peruvian general election after candidates Keiko Fujimori and Rafael López Aliaga launched smear campaigns against front runner Pedro Castillo, who was a leftist and held opposing views to them. After Castillo won the second round, Fujimori and her allies attempted to overturn the election, alleging fraud while not conceding. These claims, while not supported by evidence, was supported by other prominent conservatives such as Vladimiro Montesinos, who aided the overturn attempts while imprisoned. Days before Castillo was to be inaugurated, Fujimori finally conceded and the National Office of Electoral Processes officially declared Castillo as the winner. However, Castillo's presidency was heavily obstructed by the right-wing Congress, much like his predecessors. This resulted in several instances of civil unrest and two removal attempts. Following the beginning of a third vacancy process against him, Castillo illegally attempted to execute a self-coup, which ended in his arrest and removal from the presidency. Castillo was replaced by his vice president, Dina Boluarte. Boluarte immediately began to betray her constituents, turning towards Congress while also consolidating power within the Judiciary, Armed Forces, National Police, and other governing institutions which were packed by Fujimorists and other right-wing allies of Boluarte, which led to civil unrest. The ensuing bloody crackdown led to over 80 deaths and was concurrent with allegations of human rights abuses, torture, and arbitrary killings.
Since the late 1990s, Venezuela has undergone a significant backslide in democratic institutions.[255]Chavismo propelled democratic backsliding in Venezuela.[256]
From 1958 onward, Venezuela was considered to be a relatively stable democracy within a continent that was facing a wave of military dictatorship, consuming almost all Latin American countries in the 1970s.[257][258] Until the early 1980s, it was one of Latin America's four most prosperous states; with an upper-middle economy, and a stable centre-left democracy.[258] The collapse of the oil market in the 1980s left Venezuela (a major crude oil exporter) in great debt.[257][258]
In the 1990s, during the second term of Carlos Andrés Pérez and the term of his successor Rafael Caldera, the country implemented market-oriented strategies in order to receive monetary aid from the International Monetary Fund, cuts spending on social programs, and eliminated price controls on consumer goods and gas,[257] which caused social unrest and high inflation.[258]Hugo Chávez won the presidency in December 1998 by appealing on the desires of the poor and pledging economic reforms,[257][258] and, once in office, securing his power by creating an authoritarian regime, following a relatively stable pattern between 1999 and 2003.[259] Chávez started rewriting the constitution swiftly after arriving in-office.[260] After enabling himself to legally rewrite the constitution and therewith amending a presidential term from five to six years, with a single reelection, Chávez gained full control over the military branch. This allowed him to determine military promotions, and eliminate the Senate. As a result, he no longer required legislative approval.[260][261] The weakening of political institutions and increased government corruption transformed Venezuela into a personal dictatorship.[259][262][263]
Chavez's dominance of the media (including a constant presence on television) and his charismatic personality contributed to democratic backsliding in Venezuela,[264] in addition to constitutional revisions that concentrated Chávez's power and diminished the executive's accountability.[265]
A rapid increase in crude oil prices around 2003 fueled economic growth in the country, allowing Chávez and his party to further entrench their dominance.[260] By 2004, Chávez had gained full authority over the democracy-sustaining institutions, diminishing checks and balances and the power of the National Assembly.[260] Accusing traditional parties of causing the initial economic distress through exploitation of the country, he justified the weakening of non-executive branches by arguing that those branches were dominated by the traditional parties, and therefore unreliable.[260] After Chávez' death in 2013, his successor Nicolás Maduro continued an authoritarian style of governance.[263][266][267] After the Venezuelan opposition won a majority of the National Assembly in the 2015 elections, Maduro and his allies retained control of the other key levers of power, including the military, state-run oil company, Supreme Court, and National Electoral Council.[268] In 2017, Maduro and his allies, moved to circumvent the opposition-controlled National Assembly by creating a Constituent National Assembly, dominated by government loyalists,[268] and declaring it the supreme organ of state power.[264] This move further intensified Venezuela's democratic backsliding.[268] Currently, Venezuela is an authoritarian regime,[266][267] and had even been described as a personal dictatorship.[263]
Historian Edward Watts lists the following causes as contributing to the devolution of the Roman Republic into an empire, on the theme of violating long-established norms of the republic:[269]
Abuse of political processes to personally punish opponents (by not approving a treaty) and obstructionist tactics that blocked reforms to deal with economic inequality, forcing proponents to use more aggressive political tactics.
Soldiers becoming loyal to their commanders rather than the state, with their commanders seeking personal gains.
Resorting to violence rather than political processes to solve disputes. The first political assassinations in centuries led to armed factions influencing votes and elections, and to mob violence and civil war.
Complacency among people who found it difficult to imagine that a centuries-old republic could fail.
Ability of Augustus, the first emperor, to prevent control of Rome by foreigners and corrupt politicians, and to prevent civil war through personal dominance.
Watts points out one of the main features of a functioning republican system is that loss of an election does not result in imprisonment or execution.
The way the government came to power: During the German Revolution of 1918–19, backers of a republic joined with military mutineers who refused to fight in the face of certain defeat in World War I. The stab-in-the-back myth counterfactually proposed that Germany could have continued fighting successfully had it not been for the surrender, but for that and other reasons, many Germans blamed the republicans for losing the war, and the new system of government did not have widespread support.
Article 48 of the constitution, which gave the President the power to rule by emergency decree, a practice which was adopted as normal lawmaking broke down.
The ability of the Parliament to remove the Chancellor without assigning a replacement, which left the office vacant in 1932.
A practice of ignoring the Constitution if a law passed with a two-thirds majority, which was done in the passing of the Enabling Act of 1933, which abolished democracy.
The lack of democratic tradition and experience in lawmaking.
The Reichstag fire establishing a pretext for an anti-Communist crackdown and abolition of civil liberties, though it is disputed as to whether it was a false flag operation.
Empire of Japan
After World War I, a semi-democratic system emerged in the Empire of Japan as an experiment, with important steps including universal male suffrage in 1925 and the Rikken Seiyūkai and Rikken Minseito engaging in competitive elections. However, a partisan divide emerged between the parties, leading to many challenges such as the May 15 incident which assassinated Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi, growing economic inequality and poverty, and increasing military influence in politics. These events culminated in the Imperial Japanese Army dissolving political parties in response to resentment of economic inequality, dragging Japan into the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937.[270]
^ abcdefTamara Cofman Wittes and Yael Mizrahi-Arnaud (March 2019). Is Israel in democratic decline?(PDF) (Report). Brookings Institution. Archived(PDF) from the original on 19 December 2020. Retrieved 29 May 2020.
^Lindsay Black, Marte Boonen, Anoma van der Veere (October 2020). Make Japan Great Again — Japan's Democratic Backsliding(PDF) (Report). Fakultet Političkih Nauka Universitet u Sarajevu. Retrieved 13 August 2024.{{cite report}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: url-status (link)
^Lindsay Black, Marte Boonen, Anoma van der Veere (October 2020). Make Japan Great Again — Japan's Democratic Backsliding(PDF) (Report). Fakultet Političkih Nauka Universitet u Sarajevu. Retrieved 13 August 2024.{{cite report}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: url-status (link)
^Rüland, Jürgen (2021). "Democratic backsliding, regional governance and foreign policymaking in Southeast Asia: ASEAN, Indonesia and the Philippines". Democratization. 28: 237–257. doi:10.1080/13510347.2020.1803284. ISSN1351-0347. S2CID225373459.
^Sung-jin, Cho (4 May 2023). "S. Korea falls 4 spots on press freedom index to rank 47th in world". After falling as low as 70th during the Park Geun-hye administration in 2016, Korea's rank on the index rebounded to sit around 41-43 during the Moon Jae-in government from 2018-2022.
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