In April, Portugal was supposed to celebrate its 50-year anniversary of democracy, leadership, and stability since the Carnation Revolution, which overthrew the right-wing dictatorship that had led the country for decades. However, in March, just one month before this great milestone in the country’s history, it is facing political turmoil and democratic decay. Populist right-wing […]
Tag: democratic backsliding
Lessons in Hitting Rock Bottom: The United Kingdom’s Fall From Grace
In September 1923, the Empire of Great Britain, already the largest the world had ever seen, grew to its peak geographic size following its assumption of control over the territory of Palestine. A century later, the United Kingdom has become one of the foremost declining powers of our time as domestic incompetencies, divisions, and delusions […]
Catholic Controversy on the Brink of Polish Elections
In March of this year, a documentary came out that presented new evidence to support the claims that former Pope John Paul II was aware of sexual abuse happening within the Catholic Church of Poland during his time as archbishop and chose to cover it up. The specific allegations claim that the late pope knew […]
Democracy Under Attack in the United Kingdom
In the United Kingdom, the right to protest is under direct assault by the Conservative government. However, some of their efforts were recently dealt a significant—but limited—blow by a body of unelected nobles and aristocrats. On February 7, the House of Lords handed Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s government a substantial legislative defeat by rejecting several […]
The Fragility of Representative Governance and the Need to Protect It
Democracy is the most common form of governance. By 2017, there were more democratic than autocratic regimes in the world, a trend since the 70s. Rudimentarily, we describe there as being two forms of democracy: representative and direct. But in truth, no country in the world is a full direct democracy; every democratic country utilizes […]
Return of The Troubles? Violence in Northern Ireland Threatens Peace Between Unionists and Republicans
On March 29, several hundred young people primarily identifying as Loyalist, or Irish people with close ties to Great Britain, took to the streets of Belfast, torching vehicles and throwing bricks, fireworks and gasoline bombs at riot police attempting to restore peace. The violence did not end there. Until April 9, the day of Prince […]