Democracy continues to deteriorate
New V-Dem report shows the number of autocracies rose to a record of 42 in 2022
There are a few reports that I religiously look for every year that are pertinent to the work that I do. Freedom House’s reports, the Edelman Trust Barometer, Bruce Mehlman’s quarterly trend reports, and V-Dem’s annual democracy report.
Today, V-Dem released its 2023 report, and … it’s not a pretty picture.
For those unfamiliar with V-Dem or the Varieties of Democracy, it produces the largest global dataset on democracy, with over 31 million data points for 202 countries from 1789 to 2022. Involving almost 4,000 scholars and other country experts, V-Dem measures hundreds of different attributes of democracy. V-Dem enables new ways to study the nature, causes, and consequences of democracy, embracing its multiple meanings.
It’s the go-to data set on democracies and something we used at Facebook to help us prioritize what we would do in various countries’ elections.
Last year the key stat that I used a lot was how we had lost 30 years of democracy building in the last 10. This year, things are about the same, with the level of democracy for the average global citizen in 2022 is back to 1986 levels. More concerning is the fact that the number of autocratic countries is at its highest, with 42 - up from 33 last year.
The entire report is worth reading, but some other key findings:
Democracy has deteriorated in many regions. Asia-Pacific is now down to levels of 1978.
There are more closed autocracies than liberal democracies – for the first time in more than two decades.
72% of the world’s population – 5.7 billion people – live in autocracies by 2022.
Freedom of expression is deteriorating in 35 countries in 2022 - ten years ago it was only 7 countries.
Government censorship of the media is worsening in 47 countries over last ten years.
Government repression of civil society organizations is worsening in 37 countries.
Rule of law and the quality of elections are also facing declines in many countries.
Government censorship of the media is worsening in 47 countries.
Government repression of civil society organizations is worsening in 37 countries.
Quality of elections is worsening in 30 countries.
Now, all is not lost. The world does remain more democratic today than in the early 1970s, and substantial gains made during the “third wave of democratization” remain.
Plus, eight countries - Bolivia, Moldova, Ecuador, Maldives, North Macedonia, Slovenia, South Korea, and Zambia - have bounced back from more autocratic trends. Some themes V-Dem found between those countries were:
Large-scale popular mobilization against incumbent.
Judiciary reversing executive take-over.
Unified opposition coalescing with civil society.
Critical elections and key events bringing alternation in Power.
International democracy support and protection
There’s no mention in this report of the role that technology may have played in these findings. However, they explain how disinformation, polarization, and autocratization reinforce one another. They find that top democratizers conversely reduce the spread of
disinformation substantially, and to some extent also polarization.
This graphic, in particular, is worth looking at on the changes in the government's dissemination of false information and political polarization in that country.
Again, I highly recommend you read the entire report. Everyone has AI on the brain these days, and I couldn’t help but wonder as I read this report how these new technologies can create and fight misinformation. Will they cause more backsliding, or will we start to turn a corner? What role will the 2024 elections play in all that, and what will this report say in 2025?
Plenty of things to keep us all up at night.
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What I’m Reading
Fast Company: How OpenAI CTO Mira Murati became one of tech’s most influential innovators
Lexology: Brazil’s Senate Committee Publishes AI Report and Draft AI Law
Financial Times: Meta’s AI-driven advertising system splits marketers
WSJ: Former Facebook Execs Launch Startup, Adding to Efforts to Improve Ad Measurement
Colombia Journalism Review: Where did Facebook’s funding for journalism really go?
Colombia Journalism Review: Disrupting Journalism: How Platforms Have Upended the News
New York Times: Opposition Parties in Nigeria Call for Election Rerun, Citing Vote Rigging
NDI/IRI: Election Observation Mission presents preliminary statement and recommendations
Partnership on AI: Responsible Practices for Synthetic Media
Stratechery: An Interview with Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger About Artifact
All Tech is Human: Tech & Democracy report
YouTube: Concerns about draft EU Political Ad Rules and Freedom of Expression
Calendar
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🚨NEW 🚨
March 7, 2023 - Senate Judiciary Hearing - Reining in Dominant Digital Platforms: Restoring Competition to Our Digital Markets
March 8, 2023 - Senate Judiciary Hearing - Platform Accountability: Gonzalez and Reform
March 9, 2023 - House Judiciary Hearing on the Twitter Files
Topics to keep an eye on:
March 6 - 90 day deadline for Facebook to respond to the Oversight Board on cross-check
YouTube Decision on Trump Reinstatement
Facebook 2020 election research
TV shows about Facebook - Doomsday Machine and second season of Super Pumped
March 5, 2023 - Estonia Election
March 6, 2023 - Meta response to cross-check due
March 10 - 19: SXSW (Here’s the panel I’ll be on! And this is one with the Integrity Institute.)
March 23, 2023: TikTok CEO Congressional Hearing
March 23, 2023 - Dead line for companies to have to comply with Jordan subpoena
March 20 - 24, 2023: Mozilla Fest
March 29 - 30, 2023: Summit for Democracy
March 2023 - Antigua and Barbuda Election
March 2023 - Federated States of Micronesia Election
March 2023 - Guinea Bissau Election
March 2023 - Sierra Leone Election
April 30, 2023 - Benin Election
April 30, 2023 - Paraguay Election
April 2023 - Andorra Election
April 2023 - Finland Election
April 2023 - Montenegro Election
May 7, 2023 - Thailand Election
May 15-16: Copenhagen Democracy Summit
June 5-9: RightsCon
June 24 - June 30: Aspen Ideas Festival
June 25, 2023 - Guatemala Election
June 25, 2023 -Turkey Election
TBD June: DFR Lab 360/OS
July 11-13, 2023 - TrustCon
July 2023 - Cambodia Election
July 2023 - Timor-Leste Election
July 2023 - Zimbabwe Election
August 6, 2023 - Greece Election
August 2023 - Eswatini Election
August 2023 - First GOP Presidential Primary Debate
September 27-29, 2023: Athens Democracy Forum
TBD September: Atlantic Festival
TBD September: Unfinished Live
September 2023 - Mauritania Election
September 28-29, 2023 - Trust & Safety Research Conference
October 8 - 12: Internet Governance Forum - Japan
October 10, 2023 - Liberia Election
October 12, 2023 - Pakistan Election
October 14, 2023 - New Zealand Election
October 22, 2023 - Switzerland Election
October 2023 - Argentina Election
October 2023 - Luxembourg Election
October 2023 - Oman Election
November 12, 2023 - Poland Election
November 20, 2023 - Marshall Islands Election
November 29, 2023 - Ukraine Election
November 2023 - Bhutan Election
November 2023 - Gabon Election
November 2023 - Rwanda Election
December 10, 2023 - Spain Election
December 2023 - Bangladesh Election
December 2023 - Democratic Republic of the Congo Election
December 2023 - Togo Election
TBD - Belarus Election
TBD - Cuba Election
TBD - Equatorial Guinea Election
TBD - Guinea Election
TBD - Madagascar Election
TBD - Maldives Election
TBD - Myanmar Election
TBD - Singapore Election
TBD - South Sudan Election - (Unlikely to happen)
TBD - Turkmenistan Election
TBD - Tuvalu
TBD - Haiti
July 15-18, 2024 - Republican National Convention