The wave of repression that began in the summer of 2023 has continued following the February 2024 presidential election. For the last 20 years, Azerbaijan has steadily slipped down the international rankings for democratic principles and freedom of [...]Read the full article
Mandeep Tiwana:“Although most countries have embraced the ritual of elections, the quality of democracy on offer is poor. In short, many elections in 2024 will be less free and transparent than the winners want us to believe.”Read the full article
“Internet shutdowns have a negative impact on democracy in French-speaking Africa, especially during election periods. They constitute a form of censorship that limits freedom of expression and access to information. They prevent citizens from finding out about candidates and election issues, [...]Read the full article
The success of the far right in Argentina “cannot be separated from a critical political and economic situation [with galloping inflation] that makes you feel like your income is losing value from one minute to the next. It’s a daily battle through the economy, which causes tremendous [...]Read the full article
“In addition to being a health crisis, the pandemic has resulted in a global restructuring of our living and working conditions,” says Chilean psychologist Alondra Carrillo, former spokesperson for the Coordinadora Feminista 8M and member of the Constitutional Convention of [...]Read the full article
Enis Coşkun:On 14 May, the people of Turkey will elect their president and members of parliament. A hundred years after the foundation of a secular state under the leadership of Mustafa Kemal, these elections are crucial to the country’s [...]Read the full article
For the past five years, workers in Latin America’s largest country have faced job insecurity, rising unemployment and weakened trade unions.Read the full article
Hard hit by the pandemic and several years of economic woes, Brazil’s poor population is once again experiencing disturbing levels of food insecurity, affecting nearly 125 million people, that is, almost six out of ten Brazilians.Read the full article
The leftist president-elect is seeking to form a coalition government that will allow him to deliver the far-reaching reforms he has promised. The economy will be the yardstick by which he will be measured.Read the full article
On 10 November 2020, the Nagorno-Karabakh war between Armenia and Azerbaijan came to an end. The conflict left thousands dead and wounded and tens of thousands of people displaced. Armenia is still stinging from its defeat and has yet to turn the [...]Read the full article
On 7 November, Nicaraguans will elect a president. They will do so amid a wave of repression, with a presidential couple seeking re-election and controlling all the powers of the state. Daniel Ortega has already accumulated 25 years in power, more than any dictator from the country’s [...]Read the full article
Protests, walk-outs and work stoppages from workers at some of Belarus’s biggest heavy industries played a key role in Belarus’s historic pro-democracy movement last August.Read the full article
Frank Hoffer:The ILO’s findings not only demand clear action by Belarus to respect international human rights, but they also establish a moral imperative for the international community not to stand idly by.Read the full article
Women have been at the forefront of protests against the coup that deposed Myanmar’s civilian government led by the iconic Aung San Suu Kyi. The role they will play and the space they will occupy going forward, whether under military rule or a restored democracy, remains to be [...]Read the full article
As the Central African Republic experiences new outbreaks of violence, people are fleeing en masse to neighbouring countries, posing the risk of a humanitarian disaster.Read the full article
Given the significant differences between the positions of key political players (left, right, anti-system, nationalist, constitutionalist, etc.), there is a real risk that the ‘Catalan conflict’ will join the list of frozen conflicts.Read the full article
Jesús A. Núñez Villaverde:Morocco is continuing to score points in its overt bid to gain total control of Western Sahara, tipping the balance ever more clearly in its favour. The UN and the ‘Group of Friends’ have long since given up on jeopardising their ties with Rabat for the sake of the [...]Read the full article
With the work of human rights organisations regularly obstructed, with independent media under fire, and the courts filled with PiS loyalists, the ruling party has launched an ugly, multi-pronged culture war on Poland’s LGBTI community, in a bid to further polarise a divided society and [...]Read the full article
Víctor Báez Mosqueira :For almost a year now, Bolivians have been enduring massacres, repression, detentions and exile. According the Defensoría del Pueblo, the de facto government “has committed crimes against humanity.” A country crying out for a return to the rule of law will finally get a chance to vote on 18 [...]Read the full article
Spearheading the demonstrations that have rocked the Belarusian regime since the re-election of Alexander Lukashenko, the country’s youth have become unexpected players on the political stage. Whether for or against the leader, they have been stirred into action, and are set to be the [...]Read the full article
Andrew Firmin:“The pandemic certainly makes elections harder, but it does not make them impossible, and there is an emerging body of good practice about how to hold elections during these unusual times.”Read the full article
Luca Visentini:The political world may be divided in its support for or opposition against President Lukashenko, but the trade union movement is unified and solid: we support the people’s movement against police violence, for democracy, for the right to political protest, and for freedom of assembly and [...]Read the full article
There is a socially-charged element behind the success of sounds like reggaeton and artists like Bad Bunny. The new stars of the Spanish-language music scene played a leading role in the marches that shook Latin America in 2019 and their influence could be decisive in the upcoming US [...]Read the full article
The persistent efforts of the opposition, civil society and community organisations has led to a result, following Malawi’s disputed ‘Tipp-ex election’ in May 2019, that few could have imagined.Read the full article
Theo Morrissey:“Rather than vying for space in the middle of a saturated election campaign, the Irish election suggests that trade unions can affect political change by putting in the hard slog ahead of time to lay the foundations.”Read the full article
Housing in Vienna costs significantly less than in other European capitals. This is partly due to the fact that close to half of Vienna’s housing stock consists of public housing, a 20th century political legacy of the Social Democratic [...]Read the full article
After a few months of vacillating in response to the Hirak protest movement, Algerian authorities have been steadily retightening their grip on public spaces, the media and civil society organisations, targeting grassroots activists, trade unionists and [...]Read the full article
The current political upheaval in Bolivia threatens to undo the reforms undertaken by Evo Morales over the last 13 years, as well as the economic turnaround promoted by the former president.Read the full article
After eight months of protests, Algerians want change. They do not believe that minor reforms or the elections scheduled for December are capable of resolving the profound economic and social discontent in the country.Read the full article
“Sometimes, I tell the children: there’s nothing to eat. And they’re getting used to it. It’s awful, and it makes me angry. But I don’t want to fall apart, for their sake.”Read the full article
With record low-unemployment rates and millions of Polish people of working age living and working elsewhere, an estimated 1.5 million migrant workers are needed by 2025 to power the country’s economic growth.Read the full article
Argentina, in the midst of economic turmoil compounded by the highest interest rates in the world and the insistence on pressing ahead with failed policies, is heading towards a presidential election marked by socio-economic strife, political polarisation and a range of [...]Read the full article
Indonesia is home to some of the largest forest mass in the world and yet almost 20 per cent of Indonesians do not believe that climate change is linked to human action.Read the full article
Emerging as a powerful campaigner in this election, the Australian trade union movement is calling on Australians to vote to “change the rules” in favour of workers.Read the full article
Luca Visentini:The outcome of the elections will dictate whether the EU will make progress towards greater social equality and cohesion, or start to break up under the weight of national self-interests and xenophobia.Read the full article