In a Year of Elections, Democracy is on the Line

Europe|Can Democracy Prevail? Upcoming Elections Could Provide a Clue.

This article is from a special report on the Athens Democracy Forum in association with The New York Times.

Elections are being held this year in as many as 60 countries, including seven of the world’s 10 most populous. They will test the ability of democracies to defend their values, especially with the increasing influence of extremist and populist parties and the politicians who lead them.

But as democracy tries to defend itself, it faces the challenge of doing so while adhering to its own values. Prime among them must be its central tenet: the right of every citizen to vote and to have a voice. The rise of the far right would suggest that liberal democrats should be careful not to patronize those who disagree with them, analysts say, let alone consider them, in Hillary Clinton’s exasperated words eight years ago, a “basket of deplorables.”

There are numerous reasons for more widespread disaffection with liberal democracy and its performance, analysts say, many of them stemming from slow economic growth, unemployment from automation and globalization, and anxieties over migration and ethnicity — all of which challenge traditional ideas of identity and national character.

It is often stoked by politicians making false claims and playing off popular prejudices.

Prime among the major threats to democracy now, the analysts suggest, is “democratic backsliding” — the tendency for existing democracies to slip backward toward more authoritarianism. Leaders often elected in the name of reform can use existing powers to weaken democratic institutions and checks and balances, including the independence of the judiciary and of the media, to try to preserve power for themselves and their parties in future elections, which may be less free and fair.

Examples, the analysts say, can be found in Hungary, Slovakia, Turkey, Mexico, the United States and India, too — established democracies that have already slid backward or are veering in that direction, in what is sometimes called “democratic deconsolidation.”