Nahla El-Menshawy
Legitimacy is as vital to the consolidation of authoritarian regimes as it is in democracies, where it is more studied. Nahla El-Menshawy illustrates how regime type, ideology, and historical legacies influence autocratic legitimation strategies Read more
Paul Emiljanowicz
Paul Emiljanowicz manages Participedia, the largest database documenting democratic innovations from around the world. To prevent reproducing coloniality, Paul writes, we must commit to expanding our knowledge about democracy and recognising the experiences and knowledges of all peoples Read more
Nitesh Anchan
Russia justified its invasion of Ukraine mainly on political grounds, but also claimed a cultural reason: the construction of a Eurasian civilisation. To Nitesh Anchan and Priya Vijaykumar Poojary, the Russia-Ukraine war signifies that global politics in the 21st century will be dominated by the rhetoric of the civilisation state Read more
Eduardo Burkle
Reliable, accessible human rights data is vital to track the human rights performance of countries worldwide. Good data can help create a world where those rights are better understood and fulfilled. Discussing measurement projects, new methodologies, and the limits of human rights data is therefore vital, writes Eduardo Burkle Read more
Henry Giroux
Henry Giroux takes stock of the sciences of the democracies to argue that they offer helpful tools to contest the neoliberalisation of education and the teaching of democracy. The words of democracy, the ideas imbued in them, are vital resources for an age characterised by the desertification of public spheres Read more
Edward Goldring
Hager Ali launched this series by pointing out that 'we lack the terminology to do anything beyond counting non-democracies'. Yet Edward Goldring argues that we sometimes struggle to accurately do that. This raises troubling questions for analyses of non-democracies – and emphasises the importance of studying history Read more
Kiran Auerbach
What explains democratic skepticism in Central and Eastern Europe? Kiran Auerbach and Bilyana Petrova show that post-communist citizens’ low support for democracy is linked to dissatisfaction with the way democracy is practiced in their countries Read more
Brigitte Geißel
Most people agree that citizens are the sovereign in a democracy, but this principle is amazingly neglected when it comes to the design of democracy. Brigitte Geißel advocates for a new approach. Democracy means self-governing, so citizens should decide how to govern themselves Read more
