🌊 Undermining democracy in Southeast Europe

Damir Kapidžić

Illiberal politics are a way to understand the process by which ruling elites (mis)use democratic institutions of the state to create an electoral advantage for themselves with the aim to remain in power indefinitely. With a focus on Southeast Europe, Damir Kapidžić explains the concept's roots in institutional legacies of past regimes

October 20, 2021

🌊 Civil society organisations under pressure in the world’s biggest democracy

Soumi Banerjee

Soumi Banerjee and Rishi Jha argue that the rising wave of illiberalism is causing a shift in state-civil society relationships around the world. In contemporary India, the government often targets NGOs, resulting in the partial or complete seizure of operations

September 7, 2021

🌊 Despite illiberal challenges, the golden age of democracy is now

Lea Heyne

rather than the exception, writes Lea Heyne. The world is moving in a direction of more democracy, not less

August 27, 2021

🌊 Harnessing illiberalism’s analytical leverage

Julian G. Waller

Some contemporary political developments take inspiration from fascism. But analogies between modern anti-liberal reaction and earlier totalitarian ideologies tend to obscure more than they enlighten. The concept of illiberalism allows us to make cross-national, ideational comparisons – especially transhistorical ones, writes Julian G. Waller

August 24, 2021

🌊 Citizens pay the highest price for illiberal governments

Akudo McGee

Escalating rule of law crises in Poland and Hungary have led to calls for their expulsion from the European Union. Yet, argues Akudo McGee, such calls overlook the fact that the true losers of Polexit or Hungexit won’t be unruly governments

August 22, 2021

🌊 The new leader of the Finns Party reinforces an illiberal turn

Emilia Palonen

The Finns Party elected a new leader this weekend. The baton passed from Jussi Halla-aho to his radical right-hand woman Riikka Purra. This, writes Emilia Palonen, is a move that consolidates the Finns as a party of illiberal right-wingers

August 6, 2021

🌊 Back to the future: illiberal democracy feeds on fascist ghosts

Luca Manucci

Luca Manucci, in a panoramic survey of the rise of illiberalism in our times, argues that this trend is feeding on authoritarian historical legacies and memories which are being rewritten before our eyes. It is an exercise all democrats should challenge, and resist

December 19, 2022

🦋 We must rethink our understanding of democratic trends

Alex Prior

The ‘total texture’ of democracy exists, and we can observe it, argues Alex Prior. This is possible through a conceptualisation of this ‘texture’ as fractal: being complex and self-referential at every scale. Through this perspective, we can problematise long-standing – but nevertheless incomplete – analogies of democracy and democratisation

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