Democracy approaches 2025 bruised but resilient

LONDON (Reuters) – Democracy looks bruised but not battered as 2025 approaches. In a year in which countries representing nearly half the world’s population called voters to the polls, democracies have endured major violence and scares, but also demonstrated resilience.

Former US President Donald Trump survived two assassination attempts and, despite fears of a disputed outcome and unrest, won back the White House with a clear victory and appears poised for a peaceful transition to power. next month.

Mexico recorded the bloodiest elections in its modern history with 37 candidates assassinated before the vote, but then elected its first female president, Claudia Sheinbaum.

On four continents, incumbent leaders were ousted from office in elections that often sparked violence, but ultimately achieved a central function of democracy: the orderly transfer of power in accordance with voters’ wishes.

Long-time ruling parties in South Africa and India retained power but lost their absolute majority.

Why it matters

South Korea’s political crisis this month shows why the health of democracy is important.

In a few disconcerting hours, the president of Asia’s fourth-largest economy and a key ally of the U.S. military declared martial law in a televised evening address, then quickly reversed course after lawmakers and large crowds challenged him.

Parliament later impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol, but he rejected calls to resign, pending a decision by the Constitutional Court on his future. These events have spooked markets and South Korea’s allies, who are concerned about its ability to deter nuclear-armed North Korea.

In Europe, the far right has made progress in Germany, France, Austria, the European Parliament and Romania, where the presidential election will be renewed after accusations of Russian interference.

This fueled a lively academic debate over whether Europe was reliving a gentler version of the 1930s, when fascism was on the march.

Russian-leaning parties also performed better than polls predicted in Georgia and Moldova.

Europe’s rightward shift reflects economic concerns, but those same concerns have also led to political shifts in the other direction, as in Britain, where the left-wing Labor Party ended 14 years conservative regime.

Overall, no attempts have been made this year to prevent a peaceful transfer of power, according to Yana Gorokhovskaia, research director at the US pro-democracy lobby Freedom House, which publishes an annual report on global democracy.

But Gorokhovskaia said autocracies have become more repressive in 2024, citing sham elections in Russia, Iran and Venezuela. Freedom House says voters had little choice at the polls in a quarter of the 62 elections held between January 1 and November 5.

“It’s not so much that democracy is losing ground; it’s that autocracies are getting worse,” she said.

What this means for 2025

Far fewer elections are planned for 2025, although Germany will again test the appeal of the far right in a country so traumatized by the Nazi era that it has put in place checks and balances to prevent right-wing extremists to regain power. German voters will elect a new parliament on February 23.

Another focus in 2025 will be how democratic institutions, such as a free press and an independent judiciary, will fare under leaders who come to power or are re-elected this year.

In this context, Freedom House says it will examine what Trump does during his second term. Trump has said the mainstream press is corrupt and that he will investigate or prosecute his political rivals, former intelligence officials and prosecutors who investigated him.

The coming year is also likely to be momentous for Bangladesh and Syria, where revolutions have toppled autocratic rulers with breathtaking speed.

The head of Bangladesh’s interim government, Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, began drafting electoral reforms after massive protests prompted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to resign and flee to India. He estimates elections could be held by the end of 2025, provided the most fundamental reforms are implemented first.

In Syria, after 13 years of civil war, armed rebels took the capital Damascus in a lightning advance, prompting President Bashar al-Assad to flee to Russia. Much of the country is now ruled by rebels led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, designated by some Western countries as a terrorist group.

The new leaders talk about tolerance and the rule of law, but so far they have made no public statements about the elections.