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First, Murdoch papers targeted me. Now there is evidence they falsely implicated me in a cover-up
by Gordon Brown 31/7/24 The Guardian
Blazoned across the top of every edition of the Washington Post is the statement “Democracy dies in darkness”. But what if the publisher himself is a master of the dark arts? I experienced, at first-hand, the journalistic techniques that the Washington Post’s publisher and chief executive, Sir William Lewis, and his colleagues used when working for the Murdoch media group and the Daily Telegraph in the UK
How media smuggling took hold in North Korea
by News Desk 18/12/16 PBS NEWS
In recent years, some of these defectors, who now live in South Korea, have sought to undermine the grip of the Kim regime on North Korean citizens. They transfer media, including American movies and TV shows, to USB drives and smuggle them to North Korea, where they are passed around to citizens who have no access to the internet or any information outside the country.
Social media: How do other governments regulate it?
It is supposed to make the companies protect users from content involving things like violence, terrorism, cyber-bullying and child abuse.
4 things to know about Trump's plan for a 'crypto strategic reserve'
[https://www.npr.org/2025/03/04/g-s1-51748/trump-crypto-reserve-bitcoin-stockpile-ether by Juliana Kim 4/3/25 npr]
President Trump has announced plans for a "Crypto Strategic Reserve," which would set up the United States to buy and sell cryptocurrency and could be a game changer for the industry.
New documentary details how governments use spyware to monitor citizens’ phones
This past week, the White House detailed the scope of a massive Chinese hacking campaign that reaped information from American cell phone networks. But an HBO original documentary, “Surveilled,” says some governments use commercial spyware to monitor their own citizens. To learn more, John Yang speaks with Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Ronan Farrow, who produced the documentary.
3 reasons why New Zealand has the best-designed government in the world
Eritrea country profile
Tensions remained high across the closed and heavily-fortified border until 2018, when Ethiopia launched a surprise diplomatic initiative that formally ended the state of war between the two countries.
Algeria forms new government with energy and finance ministers unchanged
ALGIERS, July 7 (Reuters) - Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune on Wednesday named a new government, with the energy and finance ministers from the previous administration both keeping their jobs, the presidency said.
What is the Great Reset - and how did it get hijacked by conspiracy theories?
by BBC Monitoring and BBC Reality Check 23/6/21 BBC
Believers spin dark tales about an authoritarian socialist world government run by powerful capitalists and politicians - a secret cabal that is broadcasting its plan around the world.
What is open government, and how will it help us achieve the SDGs?
by Stephen Davenport 6/11/15 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
The open government agenda is most closely linked to the ambitious Goal 16 on Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, which among other targets includes the objective of ensuring “responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative decision-making at all levels.” Though progress in this area is maddeningly difficult to quantify, evidence increasingly shows that participation, the next transparency frontier, matters to development outcomes. Making the target explicit, it is hoped, will galvanize efforts in the right direction.
Conservatives aim to restructure U.S. government and replace it with Trump’s vision
by Lisa Mascaro 29/8/23 PBS NEWS
WASHINGTON (AP) — With more than a year to go before the 2024 election, a constellation of conservative organizations is preparing for a possible second White House term for Donald Trump, recruiting thousands of Americans to come to Washington on a mission to dismantle the federal government and replace it with a vision closer to his own.
Israel’s new right-wing government is even more extreme than protests would have you think
It’s also not a huge departure from previous ones.
How 5 Tech Giants Have Become More Like Governments Than Companies
This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. It's difficult to get jazzed about smartphones and social networks when they might be ruining the world.
Global Gender Gap Report 2023
This chapter sheds light on global workforce, leadership and skilling patterns across industries and across time to give a more nuanced picture of the current anatomy of gender gaps in labour markets and senior leadership to equip decision-makers with the data to tackle gender gaps in the most targeted and impactful way possible.
Which countries have the most – and least – efficient governments?
by Paul Muggeridge 13/7/15 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
The efficiency of government has a significant bearing on a country’s competitiveness and economic growth. Excessive bureaucracy and regulation, a lack of transparency, and inadequate legal frameworks all impose additional costs on business and impede expansion.
Cryptocurrency regulations are changing across the globe. Here's what you need to know
by Ian Shine 2/5/24 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
Cryptocurrency has often been synonymous with a lack of regulation. However, this is rapidly starting to change, with governments around the world now considering rules for digital currencies.
3 ways governments can solve migration crises
by William Lacy Swing 22/7/15 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
Nearly 2,000 people have died in the Mediterranean since the beginning of 2015. This is double the number of deaths for the same period last year. It clearly needs to stop. Europe is doing an incredible job rescuing migrants who board unworthy vessels to cross the sea. This year alone, 150,000 migrants coming from Syria, Eritrea, Afghanistan, Somalia, Nigeria and from other sub-Saharan countries have reached the coasts of Greece, Italy, Malta and Spain.
These are the biggest global risks we face in 2024 and beyond
by Ellissa Cavaciuti-Wishart 10/1/24 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
The cascading shocks that have beset the world in recent years are proving intractable. War and conflict, polarized politics, a continuing cost-of-living crisis and the ever-increasing impacts of a changing climate are destabilizing the global order.
Why the far right is surging all over the world
The “reactionary spirit” and the roots of the US authoritarian moment.
Why networked governments are key to better societies
by Jane E. Fountain 13/2/17 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
The government of the future operates seamlessly across boundaries to address complex challenges in a hyperconnected world. Increasingly, business and government executives manage an enterprise that works across organizations to tackle “wicked” problems, those that demand expertise and solutions brought together from disparate sources. Examples of such problems include economic development, intelligence sharing, disaster preparedness and recovery, and a range of social, environmental and financial issues.
During Covid, most governments just gave people money
by Siobhan McDonough 27/7/22 Vox
The largest cash transfer scale-up ever mirrors global inequalities.
What are central bank digital currencies and what could they mean for the average person?
by Sandra Waliczek 6/10/23 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
Money has taken many forms over the centuries. In fact, it’s not even always been money at all. It gradually evolved from bartered commodities to pieces of metal, before becoming paper money and eventually debit and credit cards. The next step in this evolution could be central bank digital currencies (CBDCs).
What kind of coalition government could Germany have after the election?
by Riham Alkousaa 23/25 Reuters
The composition of the coalition will depend on whether the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP) and leftist Sahra Wagenknecht Bewegung (BSW) hovering around the 5% threshold needed to take seats, enter the parliament.
3 global issues governments can solve at a local level
by Vincent Chin 14/9/21 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
Despite these barriers governments can’t avoid these large problems. Instead, they can tackle even the thorniest of issues by thinking big, acting fast, but starting small. In practice, this means viewing a global concern through a local lens; addressing it with a pragmatic but innovative solution, and as positive results emerge, scaling it so its reach broadens among wider regions and groups of people.
5 ways governments can unlock a more social economy
by Johanna Mair 23/5/22 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
The COVID-19 pandemic has been no ordinary crisis. The worst health emergency in more than a century has been compounded by growing inequality and rapidly rising food and energy prices this year. This causes structural damage to economies and people’s lives on a scale that can hardly be addressed by means of traditional approaches of fiscal and monetary stimulus.
What do we mean by 'governance'?
by Anna Bruce-Lockhart 26/2/16 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
Global governance, good governance, failing governance: like so many buzzwords in the field of international development, the word has come to mean different things to different groups.
The top 5 countries for electric vehicle adoption
by Joel Jaeger 3/10/23 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
Electric vehicle sales have been growing exponentially due to falling costs, improving technology and government support. Globally, 10% of passenger vehicles sold in 2022 were all-electric, according to analysis of data from the International Energy Agency. That’s 10 times more than it was just five years earlier.
Which type of coercion is best for settling trade disputes?
by Giovanni Facchini 11/4/15 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
In international trade disputes, coercion is often used against governments whose trade practices are deemed unfair. Trade coercion occurs when a government (the ‘sender’) makes a demand backed by threats to use retaliatory sanctions against a trading partner (the ‘target’) if the latter does not acquiesce to this demand.
Why there will be plenty of jobs in the future — even with artificial intelligence
by Henrik Ekelund 26/2/24 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
In the early 1960s, just as the information technology revolution was taking its first baby steps, a committee of scientists and social activists sent an open letter to the US President, Lyndon B. Johnson: “The cybernation revolution” will create “a separate nation of the poor, the unskilled, the jobless” who will be unable to find work and to afford life’s necessities, they argued.
Why we need a new economic model
by Jeffrey D. Sachs 26/11/14 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
Two schools of thought tend to dominate today’s economic debates. According to free-market economists, governments should cut taxes, reduce regulations, reform labor laws, and then get out of the way to let consumers consume and producers create jobs. According to Keynesian economics, governments should boost total demand through quantitative easing and fiscal stimulus. Yet neither approach is delivering good results. We need a new Sustainable Development Economics, with governments promoting new types of investments.
Does foreign aid always help the poor?
by Ana Swanson 23/10/15 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
Deaton, an economist at Princeton University who studied poverty in India and South Africa and spent decades working at the World Bank, won his prize for studying how the poor decide to save or spend money. But his ideas about foreign aid are particularly provocative. Deaton argues that, by trying to help poor people in developing countries, the rich world may actually be corrupting those nations’ governments and slowing their growth. According to Deaton, and the economists who agree with him, much of the $135 billion that the world’s most developed countries spent on official aid in 2014 may not have ended up helping the poor.
Can government spending encourage entrepreneurship?
by Asif Islam 12/2/15 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
A fairly robust finding is that total government spending is negatively correlated with entrepreneurship. The proposed rationale for this relationship falls under either one of two categories. The first is that government spending is a proxy for government size. Under this scenario high level of government spending implies high levels of government involvement both in terms of burdensome regulations and crowding out of the private sector; both factors considered to be detrimental towards entrepreneurship. The second hypothesis is that total government spending goes hand in hand with high levels of social welfare spending. High levels of welfare spending may provide safety nets for potential entrepreneurs, effectively raising the opportunity cost of entrepreneurship, thus discouraging entrepreneurship.
Thales warns governments over reliance on Starlink-type systems
PARIS, March 4 (Reuters) - The head of one of Europe's largest satellite manufacturers, France-based Thales (TCFP.PA), opens new tab, has highlighted the risks to governments of relying too heavily on private satellite constellations in an apparent warning over Elon Musk's Starlink.
7 ways governments can foster entrepreneurship
by Maxime Paradis by Maxime Paradis 14/2/23 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
Entrepreneurship plays a vital role in driving economic growth and job creation. It is the engine that propels innovation, generates new businesses and brings fresh products and services to the market. Starting and running a business can be challenging. Entrepreneurs often struggle with access to funding, navigating complex regulations and acquiring the necessary skills and knowledge.
The COVID-19 pandemic has changed education forever. This is how
by Cathy Li 29/4/20 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUm
While countries are at different points in their COVID-19 infection rates, worldwide there are currently more than 1.2 billion children in 186 countries affected by school closures due to the pandemic. In Denmark, children up to the age of 11 are returning to nurseries and schools after initially closing on 12 March, but in South Korea students are responding to roll calls from their teachers online.
What is government’s role in sparking innovation?
by Mariana Mazzucato 17/4/15 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
In fact, governments can and do play a critical role in spurring innovation – actively creating new markets, instead of just fixing them. To be sure, advocates of a limited economic role for government believe that market failure justifies some funding of infrastructure and basic science. But such limited intervention can hardly explain the billions of public-sector dollars that have flowed toward downstream applied research, even providing early-stage financing for companies. Indeed, in some of the world’s most famous innovation hubs, the state has played a key “entrepreneurial” role, envisioning and financing the creation of entire new fields, from information technology to biotech, nanotech, and green tech.
McKinsey: These are the skills you will need for the future of work
by Marco Dondi 28/6/21 WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
To future-proof citizens’ ability to work, they will require new skills—but which ones? A survey of 18,000 people in 15 countries suggests those that governments may wish to prioritize.
International Conference on the Future Agenda of Action for Global Diaspora Engagement, 12-13 Sept 2024, Cabo Verde
In 2022, against the backdrop of the upcoming International Migration Forum Review (IMRF) organized in the framework of the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly, and Regular Migration, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) partnered with the Government of Ireland and key participating states to co-host the inaugural Global Diaspora Summit (GDS). This summit, marking a significant milestone in diaspora engagement, culminated in the adoption of the Dublin Declaration, a comprehensive plan of action aiming to institutionalize and operationalize diaspora capitals across policies, programs, and partnerships within a coherent framework.
When is targeted surveillance wrong?
We all know that privacy matters. Our private thoughts, texts, friendships, social interactions make up who we are. It’s why COVID-19 has revived fears about governments and corporations snooping on our every move – and with good reason. At least one of the companies looking to capitalise on the contact tracing dilemma is NSO, the controversial company currently being sued by WhatsApp for allegedly installing spyware on the phones of thousands of users – including activists and journalists.
Revealed: how top PR firm uses ‘trust barometer’ to promote world’s autocrats
by Adam Lowenstein 24/11/23 The Guardian
Public trust in some of the world’s most repressive governments is soaring, according to Edelman, the world’s largest public relations firm, whose flagship “trust barometer” has created its reputation as an authority on global trust. For years, Edelman has reported that citizens of authoritarian countries, including Saudi Arabia, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates and China, tend to trust their governments more than people living in democracies do.
Arbitrary Detention and Short-Term Imprisonment
by Kenneth Roth HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
Security officers rarely present arrest warrants to justify detaining critics. In some cases, detainees are released after receiving official warnings, which prosecutors may use in subsequent criminal trials to show a pattern of what they call “delinquent” behavior.
Governments Fail to 'Rise to the Moment' as Seabed Meeting Ends Without Mining Pause
by Olivia Rosane 26/6/25 Common Dreams
"Governments have yet to rise to the moment," Greenpeace International campaigner Louisa Casson said in a statement. "They remain disconnected from global concerns and the pressing need for courageous leadership to protect the deep ocean."
Chinese Government Poses Global Threat to Human Rights
(New York) – The Chinese government is carrying out an intense attack on the global system for defending human rights, Kenneth Roth, executive director at Human Rights Watch, said today in releasing Human Rights Watch’s World Report 2020. Decades of progress that have allowed people around the world to speak freely, live without fear of arbitrary imprisonment and torture, and enjoy other human rights are at risk, Roth said.
Global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration
In adopting the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants, the Member States of the United Nations recognized the need for a comprehensive approach to human mobility and strengthened cooperation at the global level. Annex II to the Declaration set in motion a process of intergovernmental consultations and negotiations that culminated in the adoption of the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration by the United Nations General Assembly on 19 December 2018.
Refugees Welcome Index shows government refugee policies out of touch with public opinion
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 19/5/16
The new Refugees Welcome Index, based on a global survey of more than 27,000 people carried out by the internationally renowned strategy consultancy GlobeScan, ranks 27 countries across all continents based on people’s willingness to let refugees live in their countries, towns, neighbourhoods and homes.
Governments must stop conniving with fossil fuel industries to burn our rights
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 7/6/21
The world’s richest governments are effectively condemning millions of people to starvation, drought and displacement through their continued support of the fossil fuel industry, Amnesty International said today. The organization’s new policy briefing offers a damning assessment of global failures to protect human rights from climate change, and outlines how human rights law can help hold governments and companies to account.
Indigenous Peoples’ rights
There are more than 5,000 different Indigenous Peoples around the world comprising 476 million people – around 6.2% of the global population. They are spread across more than 90 countries in every region and speak more than 4,000 languages.
Myanmar: Four years after coup, world must demand accountability for atrocity crimes
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 31/1/25
This year represents a turning point for accountability in Myanmar. While the military remains in control, they are losing ground in many areas. Amid rapidly evolving patterns of hostilities and changing political dynamics, renewed efforts must push for justice and ensure a future built on a lasting culture of respect for human rights.
Column: The only conquerors of inequality are the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
by Walter Scheidel 16/6/17 PBS NEWS
The thesis of my book is that if you look at the very long run of history over hundreds of thousands of years, wherever there is documentation, you see that pretty high levels of income and wealth inequality used to be a default condition. For long periods of time, inequality tends to either go up or be stable at pretty high levels. But every single time we observe a major reduction in economic inequality, it is linked to some massive, violent shock — an upending of the established order. And that’s true across history.
Global: Failure to consult Indigenous Peoples on future pandemics will further harm children’s education
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 28/2/25
Indigenous leaders interviewed by Amnesty International for its report What If Indigenous Consent Is Not Respected?, testified to sharp and sustained increases in post-pandemic absenteeism and school dropout rates, of more than 80 per cent in some cases, among Indigenous children in more than 10 countries. Indigenous leaders and activists also voiced concerns that the often discriminatory, desultory or non-existent response by authorities to the educational needs of Indigenous children during the pandemic worsened long-standing inequities faced by Indigenous communities – with Indigenous girls and children with disabilities particularly disadvantaged. Going forward, the organization is calling for Indigenous Peoples to be consulted during future pandemics.
The message voters around the world sent to leaders in 2024: ‘You’re fired’
by Jill Lawless 30/12/24 PBS NEWS
Some 70 countries that are home to half the world’s population held elections this year, and in many incumbents were punished. From India and the United States to Japan, France and Britain, voters tired of economic disruption and global instability rejected sitting governments — and sometimes turned to disruptive outsiders.
Global: Health workers silenced, exposed and attacked
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 13/7/20
“With the COVID-19 pandemic still accelerating around the world, we are urging governments to start taking health and essential workers’ lives seriously. Countries yet to see the worst of the pandemic must not repeat the mistakes of governments whose failure to protect workers’ rights has had devastating consequences,” said Sanhita Ambast, Amnesty International’s Researcher and Advisor on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
Global: Governments’ brazen flouting of Arms Trade Treaty rules leading to devastating loss of life
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 19/8/24
Since the Arms Trade Treaty entered into force almost a decade ago, Amnesty International has continued to document and expose unlawful arms transfers that facilitate grave abuses, contravening the robust, legally-binding, global rules on international arms transfers the treaty established. On 2 April 2013, a total of 155 states voted to adopt the Arms Trade Treaty. Today, the treaty has 115 state parties and 27 signatories, including all of the top 10 arms exporters – which account for over 90% of the arms trade – except Russia.
African Governments Falling Short on Healthcare Funding
On April 27, 2001, African Union (AU) governments adopted the Abuja Declaration, in which they set a target of allocating at least 15 percent of their national budgets to improve health care. But recent analysis of two decades of data found that only two of the AU’s 55 member countries — Cabo Verde and South Africa — met this target in 2021, the most recent year for which data is available.
Governments are criminalizing homeless people to distract from their own failures
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 2/10/17
Globally, homelessness has increased in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, with many countries seeing an increase in unemployment, job insecurity and in-work poverty. In many places, this has been exacerbated by government austerity measures which result in reduced spending on social housing and homeless shelters.
8 ways to solve the world refugee crisis
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 12/10/15
Worldwide, more than 21 million people have been forced to seek sanctuary abroad. Governments have a duty to help them. But most rich countries are still treating refugees as somebody else’s problem. Hiding behind closed borders and fears of being “flooded”, they have conveniently allowed poorer, mainly Middle Eastern, African and South Asian countries, to host an incredible 86% of all refugees.
Governments have failed to protect trans people from murder – and from COVID-19
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 20/12/20
Nadia Rahman is Researcher and Policy Advisor in Amnesty’s global Gender, Sexuality and Identity Team
“COVID-19 may be a new killer – but hate has been killing us for decades.”
Amnesty International: Homophobia still tolerated by governments around the world
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 16/5/14
Governments around the world are failing to live up to their obligations to protect the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) people, Amnesty International said on the eve of the International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia.
As Online Gender-Based Violence Booms, Governments Drag Their Feet
by Heather Barr HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
Strange men came to the place where Kang Yu-jin (names are pseudonyms) worked; looking for her after her ex-boyfriend impersonated her on social media, posting sexual images and saying she wanted to find men to have sex with.
World Refugee Day: Governments, not smugglers, are the real problem
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 20/6/15
This April, a Greek soldier made international headlines when he saved the lives of several refugees off the coast of a Greek island. Antonis Deligiorgis was dubbed the “Greek hero on the beach” but he was more modest: “Without really giving it a second’s thought, I did what I had to do.”
China’s Global Threat to Human Rights
by Kenneth Roth HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
At home, the Chinese Communist Party, worried that permitting political freedom would jeopardize its grasp on power, has constructed an Orwellian high-tech surveillance state and a sophisticated internet censorship system to monitor and suppress public criticism. Abroad, it uses its growing economic clout to silence critics and to carry out the most intense attack on the global system for enforcing human rights since that system began to emerge in the mid-20th century.
2024 World Press Freedom Index – journalism under political pressure
"As more than half the world's population goes to the polls in 2024, RSF is warning of a worrying trend revealed by the 2024 World Press Freedom Index: a decline in the political indicator, one of five indicators detailed in the Index. States and other political forces are playing a decreasing role in protecting press freedom. This disempowerment sometimes goes hand in hand with more hostile actions that undermine the role of journalists, or even instrumentalise the media through campaigns of harassment or disinformation.
World Report 2023
by Tirana Hassan HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
The obvious conclusion to draw from the litany of human rights crises in 2022—from Russian President Vladimir Putin’s deliberate attacks on civilians in Ukraine and Xi Jinping’s open-air prison for the Uyghurs in China to the Taliban’s putting millions of Afghans at risk of starvation —is that unchecked authoritarian power leaves behind a sea of human suffering.
Myanmar: Government fails to protect Rohingya after world court order
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 22/5/20
“Internet blackouts have kept the Rohingya and other minorities in Rakhine and Chin States deprived of potentially life-saving information and impeded monitoring of the humanitarian situation on the ground. This information blackout puts people at greater at risk, especially in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Protesters Around the World Are Targeting Inequality. Governments Must Listen
by Sarah Saadoun 27/8/24 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
Meanwhile, in Kenya, young people have been protesting since June, when Parliament approved a tax billthat would fall hardest on the poorest. A proposed tax on menstrual pads became a symbol of how much the government was willing to squeeze people to pay off the country's debt. In July, President William Ruto sent the bill back to Parliament for revision, but pockets of protests continue, and have inspired protests in Nigeria following economic reforms that drove up the cost of living, as well as in Uganda, against government corruption.
FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION
Governments have a duty to prohibit hateful, inciteful speech but many abuse their authority to silence peaceful dissent by passing laws criminalizing freedom of expression. This is often done in the name of counterterrorism, national security or religion. More recently, freedom of expression has come under threat by authorities clamping down on activists, NGOs and individuals helping refugees and migrants.
World Report 2025
by Tirana Hassan 2024 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
This has been a year of elections, resistance, and conflict, testing the integrity of democratic institutions and the principles of international human rights and humanitarian law.
Global: Governments’ adoption of unchecked technologies in social protection systems undermines rights
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 6/3/24
“From Serbia, to India, to the Netherlands, these technologies are hailed as cutting-edge solutions by governments to achieve a better distribution of resources, improve administrative systems, detect fraud, and enhance security. However, Amnesty International’s research has shown that the unchecked digitization of social protection systems poses many risks to human rights, and exacerbates inequalities,” said Imogen Richmond-Bishop, Technology & Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Researcher at Amnesty Tech.
Amnesty International sounds alarm on a watershed moment for international law amid flagrant rule-breaking by governments and corporate actors
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 24/4/24
The world is reaping a harvest of terrifying consequences from escalating conflict and the near breakdown of international law, said Amnesty International as it launched its annual The State of the World’s Human Rights report today, delivering an assessment of human rights in 155 countries.
World Habitat Day: Governments must end the brutal practice of forced evictions (Op-Ed)
by AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL 11/10/18
In the early morning biting cold of 23 July 2018, about 10,000 people in Nairobi’s Kibera slum watched in a sleepy haze as their homes and everything they owned were flattened by bulldozers to make way for the construction of the city’s missing link road that will connect Ngong Road and Langata Road. Schools, health centres and places of worship were also brought down, forcing more than 2,000 students to discontinue their schooling.
World Health Assembly adopts historic Pandemic Agreement to make the world more equitable and safer from future pandemics
by World Health Organization 20/5/25
Member States of the World Health Organization (WHO) today formally adopted by consensus the world's first Pandemic Agreement. The landmark decision by the 78th World Health Assembly culminates more than three years of intensive negotiations launched by governments in response to the devastating impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, and driven by the goal of making the world safer from – and more equitable in response to – future pandemics.
“We Will Find You”
Transnational repression looks different depending on the context. Recent cases include a Rwandan refugee who was killed in Uganda following threats from the Rwandan government; a Cambodian refugee in Thailand only to be extradited to Cambodia and summarily detained; and a Belarusian activist who was abducted while aboard a commercial airline flight.
The Human Rights System Is Under Threat: A Call to Action
by Tirana Hassan by World Report 24
We only have to look at the human rights challenges of 2023 to tell us what we need to do differently in 2024. It was a formidable year not only for human rights suppression and wartime atrocities but also for selective government outrage and transactional diplomacy that carried profound costs for the rights of those not in on the deal. Yet amid the gloom, we saw signs of hope showing the possibility of a different path.
Yekaterina Duntsova barred from running against Putin in election
Mark Trevelyan 12/23/23 Reuters
His (Putin's) best-known opponent, Alexei Navalny, is serving prison sentences totalling more than 30 years and his supporters say they do not even know where he is, after they were told he had been moved from his previous penal colony earlier this month. Lawyers last had access to him on Dec. 6. "Any sane person taking this step would be afraid - but fear must not win," she told Reuters in an interview in November in which she called for the release of political prisoners and said Russians were "very tired" of the conflict in Ukraine. Putin's critics said the decision showed that no one with genuine opposition views would be allowed to stand against him next March in the first presidential election since the start of the 22-month war. They see it as a fake process with only one possible outcome.
Despite backlash, Masha Gessen says comparing Gaza to a Nazi-era ghetto is necessary
Rachel Treisman, Leila Fadel 12/22/23 NPR
Gessen, who is Jewish and whose family lost loved ones in the Holocaust, has been criticized for a New Yorker essay published earlier this month in which they likened the Gaza Strip to the WWII-era ghettos that Nazis developed to segregate and control Jewish people in occupied Europe. Gessen argues in the essay that treating the Holocaust as a "singular event," unlike anything that has occurred before or after in history, not only is incorrect but makes it impossible to learn lessons from the Holocaust that are needed to prevent future genocides. Gessen notes there are key differences between the two: The Nazi claim that ghettos were necessary to protect non-Jews from disease "had no basis in reality," while Israel's stance that the isolation of Gaza is necessary to protect against Palestinian terrorist attacks "stems from actual and repeated acts of violence."
All politicians “game” the system. The question is how?
What ranked choice voting in San Francisco tells us about the electoral rules and political incentives.
Lebanese candidates push for change in a corrupt electoral system
by Arezou Rezvani 14/05/2022 NPR
Lebanon is going through one of the worst economic crises in recent history. Food and fuel prices are way up. Certain medicines are hard to find. Power outages sometimes drag on for days. Tomorrow, voters have a chance to hold the ruling establishment to account in parliamentary elections. But NPR's Arezou Rezvani in Beirut explains, it won't be easy for new candidates to break through a system that's built to keep the same usual parties in charge.
Making elephants dance - a guide to Germany's electoral system
by Thomas Escritt 23/9/21 Reuters
BERLIN (Reuters) - Sixty million voters, casting twice as many votes for 47 parties, leading to a parliament that could have anywhere from 700 to as much as 1,000 legislators - the German electoral system is baffling even to Germans.
Lebanon is going through one of the worst economic crises in recent history. Food and fuel prices are way up. Certain medicines are hard to find. Power outages sometimes drag on for days. Tomorrow, voters have a chance to hold the ruling establishment to account in parliamentary elections. But NPR's Arezou Rezvani in Beirut explains, it won't be easy for new candidates to break through a system that's built to keep the same usual parties in charge.
AN ISRAELI ELECTORAL SYSTEM THAT FRUSTRATED EVEN BEN-GURION
by The New York Times Archives THE NEW YORK TIMES
This is a digitized version of an article from The Times’s print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996. To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them.
How does the UK's voting system affect smaller parties?
Winning a healthy share of votes in Thursday's election does not necessarily mean securing a similar proportion of seats in Parliament, smaller parties have complained.
Is Lebanon’s New Electoral System a Path Out of Sectarianism?
by Elias Muhanna 29/6/17 THE NEW YORKER
On Friday, June 16th, Lebanon quietly ended one of the longest stretches of government paralysis in post-Second World War history. The parliament met to ratify a new electoral law that will govern national elections next year, nearly a decade after the last parliamentary polls were held. The law’s proponents claim that it will improve representation for the many sects that compose the country’s religiously diverse population.
Public support for electoral reform: The role of electoral system experience
by Abigail L. Heller 8/21 Science Direct
What affects citizen preferences about electoral rules and under what conditions will they support changes to those rules? These questions are critical because in established democracies, citizens increasingly directly influence electoral rules through initiatives or referenda. For example, in New Zealand in 1993, voters overrode the preferences of political elites in two referenda, leading to the introduction of a mixed member proportional (MMP) system for national legislative elections (Vowles 2005).
Democratic electoral systems around the world, 1946–2000
by Matt Golder 1/3/05 Science Direct
This article describes a new data set that covers the electoral institutions used in all of the democratic legislative and presidential elections in 199 countries between 1946 (or independence) and 2000. A clear and consistent classification of the electoral institutions used in these elections is followed by a concise geographical and temporal analysis. The worldwide focus of the data set reveals several striking patterns. For example, there have been almost as many elections under dictatorship as there have been under democracy. Other patterns include the fact that presidential regimes nearly always employ proportional electoral formulas, absolute majority rule has become the worldwide norm for electing presidents, and non-majoritarian systems have become more complex due to the increasing use of multiple tiers and mixed electoral formulas.
Who controls the wealth? Electoral system design and ethnic war in resource-rich countries
by Natasha S. Neudorfer 9/14 ScienceDirect
Given that both natural resource wealth and electoral system design are frequently investigated factors in the civil wars literature (see e.g. Fearon and Laitin, 2003, Fjelde, 2009, Horowitz, 2002, Reilly, 2001), it is surprising that there is no well-known study which explicitly considers the interaction effect between these two factors on the risk of violent ethnic conflict. We seek to fill this gap in the academic debate by highlighting the impact of electoral systems for the legislature on the risk of ethnic civil war in resource-rich countries
The best of both worlds? The Danish electoral system 1915–20 in a comparative perspective
by Jorgen Elklit 3/9/92 ScienceDirect
The Danish 1915–1920 Lower House electoral system combined a traditional plurality system and a PR system with multi-stage compensatory seats in two provincial regions, and closed party list PR in the third, metropolitan, region. This complex system is presented and its effects on the distribution of seats in the Folketing are analysed. It was an early—and now neglected—case of personalized PR which calls for comparisons with later cases of this kind of electoral system, notably the post-1949 German electoral system and the 1990 electoral systems in Hungary and Bulgaria. In order to assess if such comparisons are appropriate, the paper also asks if these four electoral systems are genuine ‘mixed’ systems or PR systems in disguise.
The political consequences of the electoral system in Ireland
by Michael Gallagher 12/86 ScienceDirect
The single transferable vote electoral system, popular with many electoral reformers, has been used for parliamentary elections in the Republic of Ireland since 1922. Examination of its impact shows that it has delivered as high a degree of proportionality as most PR systems despite the unavoidable use of relatively small district magnitudes. It has not produced either a fragmented party system or unstable governments. Critics have blamed it for contributing to a weak parliament, but these criticisms remain unproven. Suggestions are made for the wider use of STV, especially in countries currently employing preferential list systems.
Elusive indeed – The mechanical versus psychological effects of electoral rules at the district level
by Philipp Harfst 6/18 ScienceDirect
While electoral research has become one of political science’s most fertile areas, to date no empirical contribution has addressed the three mechanisms of the electoral chain – strategic entry, strategic voting, and the electoral system’s mechanical effect – in a unified analytical framework. This paper addresses this shortcoming by analysing the effect of electoral systems on party system size, accounting for all three mechanisms. Our study yields three major findings drawing on constituency-level data covering 462 electoral districts in Finland and Portugal between 1962 and 2011.
The Electoral Sweet Spot: Low-Magnitude Proportional Electoral Systems
[https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1540-5907.2010.00495.x by John M Carey 1/2/11 AJPS
A glance at the electoral systems of new democracies, or reforms to electoral systems in established democracies, suggests that electoral engineers regularly seek to soften the representation-accountability trade-off and achieve both objectives. For example, some electoral systems have small multimember districts, others have high legal thresholds below which parties cannot win seats, while others have “parallel” mixed-member systems, where the PR seats do not compensate for disproportional outcomes in the single-member seats. These types of systems sacrifice pure proportionality for the specific purpose of increasing accountability.
Women’s representation in politics: The effect of electoral systems
by Martin Gonzalez 6/21 ScienceDirect
Women are underrepresented in politics. For example, they hold only 25% of legislative seats in national assemblies.1 This situation has attracted much attention in the media and in the academic literature. Perhaps the most important reason behind this interest is that having women in public office may have an impact on policy.2 In addition, women in public office may serve as role models, improving women’s self-confidence and affecting attitudes towards them both within politics and in society at large (Beaman et al., 2009, Beaman et al., 2012).
Proportionality, disproportionality and electoral systems
by Michael Gallagher 3/91 ScienceDirect
Different PR methods should be seen not as being more proportional or less proportional than each other but as embodying different ideas as to what maximizing proportionality means and, by extension, what minimizing disproportionality means. Each of the main methods of PR (d'Hondt, Sainte-Laguë, largest remainders) generates its own index of proportionality and, thus, its own way of measuring disproportionality. Applying these indices to competitive elections of the period 1979–1989 shows a high correlation between the rankings produced by the various methods, but the ordering of countries is sufficiently different to require a choice to be made between the indices.
Models of electoral system change
by Kenneth Benoit 9/04 ScienceDirect
Electoral systems are commonly treated as exogenous determinants of political party systems, yet our theoretical understanding remains limited as to how these institutions themselves are determined. Part of the problem lies with the subject matter itself: electoral system change is frequently idiosyncratic, often occurring during episodes of exceptional political change. Yet another aspect of the problem is that explanations of electoral system change frequently occur piecemeal in application to specific cases, without systematic or comparative development.
‘People were repressed into silence’: the Spanish artist creating a visual memory of fascism’s horrors
by Sam Jones 5/6/25 The Guardian
Roca, whose comics have explored such varied themes as Francoist reprisals, the exiled Spanish republicans who helped liberate Paris from the Nazis, family histories and the depredations of Alzheimer’s, is the subject of a new show at the Instituto Cervantes called Memory: An Emotional Journey Through the Comics of Paco Roca.
Mass Protests Force South Korean President to Revoke Shocking Martial Law Declaration After 6 Hours
by Amy Goodman 12/04/2024 Democracy Now
And I think what’s extraordinary is that a lot of ordinary people came out. I think I’ve heard that people were saying that there were delivery people that just stopped working. And when they heard the news, they just like rushed to the National Assembly. There were people that were at home just relaxing, and then they rushed. And a lot of the people, when they gathered, they were able to block and prevent the armored trucks from entering the grounds of the National Assembly. They were able — a lot of them were chanting to abolish the martial law and to — and, yeah, basically, abolish martial law and to — down with the dictatorship.
Ivan Ilyin The obscure 'Russian Christian Fascist' philosopher motivating Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine
Dartagnan March 09, 2022 The DailyKos
Little known in the West and largely forgotten in Russia until the early 2000s, Ilyin (1883-1954) had actually been expelled by the Bolshevik state shortly after the Revolution. His early writings, relying on a novel interpretation of the Biblical creation myth, demonstrated antipathy to secular human society and held that all efforts by mankind to impose a pluralistic political order were simply deepening man’s estrangement from God, and that this estrangement could only be corrected by the intervention of a unifying political leader. The means such a leader employed to “unify” the sinful, impure secular world were beside the point, as the end goal (generally speaking) was reunification with the original Divine plan. Since nothing could possibly be more important than that, any means to achieve it were permissible (including, presumably, violence, murder, and genocide).
Global democracy has a very bad year
GLOBAL DEMOCRACY continued its decline in 2020, according to the latest edition of the Democracy Index from our sister company, The Economist Intelligence Unit. The annual survey, which rates the state of democracy across 167 countries based on five measures—electoral process and pluralism, the functioning of government, political participation, democratic political culture and civil liberties—finds that just 8.4% of the world’s population live in a full democracy while more than a third live under authoritarian rule. The global score of 5.37 out of ten is the lowest recorded since the index began in 2006.
Democracy 2024
Our World Data by Anna Lührmann, Marcus Tannenberg and Staffan Lindberg.
Interactive map rating all the world's political systems.
Can The Forces Unleashed By Trump's Big Election Lie Be Undone?
As for where big lies lead, Snyder writes: "Post-truth is pre-fascism, and Trump has been our post-truth president." "When I say pre-fascism, I mean when you take away facts, you're opening the way for something else," Snyder tells NPR. "You're opening the way for someone who says 'I am the truth. I am your voice,' to quote Mr. Trump — which is something that fascists said, as a matter of fact. The three-word chants, the idea that the press are the enemy of the people: These are all fascist concepts." "It doesn't mean that Trump is quite a fascist himself," Snyder adds. "Imagine what comes after that, right? Imagine if the big lie continues. Imagine if there's someone who's more skillful in using it than he is. Then we're starting to move into clearly fascist territory."
It may seem Putin controls the Russian state personally. The reality is more dangerous
Yana Gorokhovskaia Tue 25 Aug 2020 09.41 EDT [1]
Popular narratives about Russia are infused with the idea that Putin sits atop a highly centralised system that he controls manually. While Putin is certainly Russia’s most important decision-maker, the political system is not his personal well-oiled machine. Instead, the system has a set of operating principles – chief among them a lack of the rule of law – and perverse accountability, which sometimes produce outcomes that are less than optimal for the Kremlin.
We often see evidence of this during elections when some regions in Russia report official results that strain credulity as local poll workers strive to please superiors with a good showing for pro-regime candidates. The problem, of course, is that while these results get the job done, they cast doubt on the legitimacy of the election and provide ammunition for critics.
Russian democracy is a farce. Putin wants the same fate for America
[2] Opinion by Garry Kasparov
Along with the fear-mongering and violence, Putin exploited the legitimate grievances of the Russian people for his own gain. His themes were familiar ones: security, cultural preservation, ethnic tension. Twitter didn't exist then, but if it had, Putin would have been tweeting "Law & order!" in Russian. Those of us in the Russian pro-democracy movement had the dual challenge of protesting Putin's crackdowns while acknowledging the other problems the country faced. I watched as Putin destroyed our fragile democracy by focusing only on his own power and wealth while mouthing nationalist rhetoric and attacking the free press. Now I'm watching Trump use many of the same techniques to chip away at democracy in my new home, although I cannot complain of exile when some of my Russian colleagues have been jailed or killed.
Ballot Fraud Gave Russia's Putin 22 Million Extra Votes, Says Expert
Examining 88 million votes, he shared graphs of his findings on Facebook, telling Forbes Russia he believed abnormalities suggested that up to 22 million votes may have been fraudulently cast in favor of the changes Putin had backed. "There has been no manipulation of votes in Russian elections on this scale in the recent past. In absolute terms, this is unprecedented," he told the publication. "In relative terms, a similar situation was seen at the 2016 State Duma elections," Shpilkin said, referring to elections for Russia's lower house of parliament.
