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Russian President Vladimir Putin plans to stay in the top job until 2036, landing a further blow on Russia’s already punch-drunk democracy. Currently in his fourth term, the nation’s

longest-serving leader since Joseph Stalin will circumvent two-term limits by resetting the count in 2024 with an amended constitution. Quickly rubber-stamped by parliament, the matter will

now go to the people for their assent on April 22, Lenin’s birthday. If Putin wins re-election twice more, he will retire at 83. Even the former KGB officer recognised the dangers of

removing term limits, though of course he can be trusted not to abuse the resulting consolidation of power. By resetting rather than abolishing the two-term limit, Putin believes Russia will

develop into a country with regular changes of president. “I’m sure the time will come when the highest, presidential authority in Russia will not be, as they say, so personified — not so

bound up in a single person,” he said. “But that is how all of our past history came together and we cannot, of course, disregard this.” Moscow’s move is just the latest attack on democracy.

This month’s Freedom House annual report on the topic found that 2019 was the 14th consecutive year of decline in global freedom. “Democracy and pluralism are under assault,” the report

states. “Dictators are toiling to stamp out the last vestiges of domestic dissent and spread their harmful influence to new corners of the world. At the same time, many freely elected

leaders are dramatically narrowing their concerns to a blinkered interpretation of the national interest. “Ethnic, religious, and other minority groups have borne the brunt of government

abuses in both democracies and authoritarian states… The unchecked brutality of autocratic regimes and the ethical decay of democratic powers are combining to make the world increasingly

hostile to fresh demands for better governance.” These findings reinforce those of the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index, released in January, which ranks 167 countries based on

60 indicators across five measures: electoral process and pluralism, the functioning of government, political participation, democratic political culture and civil liberties. It found that

globally democracy was in retreat, with the lowest average score since the study began in 2006. The index groups countries as either full democracies, flawed democracies, hybrid regimes or

authoritarian regimes. Only 22 countries were found to be full democracies, while a third of the world lives under authoritarian rule. Russia’s proposed change comes two years after China

removed term limits, effectively establishing Xi Jinping as president for life. Under his leadership over the past year, China has experienced an increase in discrimination against

minorities — particularly Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang — as well as the growth in digital surveillance, contributing to it slipping to 153rd in the rankings. The persecution of Muslims has

also undermined the world’s most populous democracy. In December, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu-nationalist government passed a law providing a pathway for illegal immigrants

from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan to gain Indian citizenship, though it excluded Muslims. The decision triggered protests and a violent response, with Muslims and mosques targeted

amid claims police failed to intervene. It is not just democracy in countries such as Russia, China and India that is under threat, but also in the United States. The Trump administration’s

foreign policy has demonstrated inconsistent commitment to democracy and human rights, remaining silent on the abuses of strategic allies Turkey and Egypt, and partly validating the

leadership of Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong-un. Domestically, the partisan impeachment of President Trump (through both the Democrat-led charges in the House of Representatives and his

acquittal in the Republican-led Senate) showed that elected representatives were placing party loyalty ahead of the national interest. This comes on top of Trump’s criticism of Congress and

the judiciary, and his unrelenting attack on the media. The Democracy Index report blames the decline in rankings among mature democracies on a failure of engagement: “The increasing vacuity

of national politics and the retreat of political elites and parties from engagement with their electorates resulted in falling levels of popular trust in political institutions and

parties, declining political engagement, and a growing resentment among electorates at the lack of political representation. Eventually the alienation of people from the 21st-century body

politic gave rise to populist movements, which repudiated the mainstream political parties and demanded a new political contract between the people and their elected representatives.”

Despite the reports’ overall findings, there are signs to pathways of democratic renewal. Of the five measures assessed by the Democracy Index, political participation had improved in every

region except North America. As a reaction to being disenfranchised, in 2019 the people took to the streets in a wave of protests in across the world. “When historians look back at 2019,”

Robin Wright wrote in the_ New Yorker_, “the story of the year will not be the turmoil surrounding Donald Trump. It will instead be the tsunami of protests that swept across six continents

and engulfed both liberal democracies and ruthless autocracies. Throughout the year, movements have emerged overnight, out of nowhere, unleashing public fury on a global scale — from Paris

and La Paz to Prague and Port-au-Prince, Beirut to Bogota and Berlin, Catalonia to Cairo, and in Hong Kong, Harare, Santiago, Sydney, Seoul, Quito, Jakarta, Tehran, Algiers, Baghdad,

Budapest, London, New Delhi, Manila, and even Moscow.” Freedom House agreed: “A striking number of new citizen protest movements have emerged over the past year, reflecting the inexhaustible

and universal desire for fundamental rights.” It is not just the people who are responsible for resuscitating democracy. A refreshing approach to engagement was France’s “great national

debate” — a series of town-hall meetings convened by President Emmanuel Macron in response to the _gilet jaunes _protests. The three-month-long national conversation, which concluded in

April, received nearly two million online contributions from citizens. The world is experiencing a lurch towards autocratic rule, even among so-called democracies, with Putin, Xi and Turkish

president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan leading the way. The people have responded through protest, but now is the time for traditional defenders of democracy to join in the fight. Great Britain

must put its years of Brexit introspection behind it and again show leadership. The United States — whatever result November’s election brings — must shed its growing nationalism and

xenophobia if it hopes to fulfil Abraham Lincoln’s commitment, “that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth”.