The year of elections – Is 2024 democracy’s biggest test ever?
Al Jazeera
More than two billion people across 50 countries are expected to go the polls this year – here are 10 major elections to watch.
It’s the year of the vote. Countries that are home to nearly half of the world’s population will pick their governments in elections in 2024 – something that has never happened in a single year before.
Starting with Bangladesh on January 7, the polls include seven out of the world’s 10 most populous nations: India, the United States, Indonesia, Pakistan, Russia and Mexico are the others.
Some are established democracies, others are fledgling ones, and still others are effectively autocracies with votes but few real options for the electorate to choose from.
Yet, amid growing concerns that democracies as a whole are backsliding – worries articulated by nonprofits like the Swedish V-Dem Institute and the US-based Freedom House – the elections in this mixed bag of nations represent a watershed year for the concept of democracy itself, according to cultural and political sociologist Andrew Perrin.
From increased ethnic violence to steps aimed at weakening judicial and other checks on the power of the executive, the threats to democracy are real, say experts. But Perrin noted that there are countervailing pressures too. The popularity of democracy as measured by public opinion remains high.
