“There has never been more countries autocratising at the same time in the world as now!” This is according to the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) report which measures democracy globally, using a Liberal Democracy Index covering electoral and liberal aspects of democracy.
By the end of last year, three out of four people worldwide (74 per cent) lived under an autocratic regime, with only around 2 billion (26 per cent) being governed democratically. Democracy, as we have known it, is literally unravelling in many places. The report refers to a deepening and spreading ‘third wave of autocratisation’, with an unprecedented number of countries autocratising simultaneously.
