Americans are often taught that democracy is the ideal and inevitable form of governance. However, recent research reveals a troubling decline in global democratic support, with increasing acceptance of authoritarian regimes. The Economic Intelligence Unit indicates that less than 7% of the global population currently lives in true democracies. Behavioral science suggests that certain unconscious biases may predispose societies to favor autocracy, especially during times of crisis, challenging the belief that democracy will prevail or spread naturally as human societies evolve.
Research findings from Political Science and Evolutionary Psychology suggest that democracy may not be "natural," whereas authoritarianism... might be."
According to the Economic Intelligence Unit of the Economist media organization, the global democracy index score is at just 5.17 out of 10, its lowest point in history.â
Historically, leadership in hunter-gatherer groups depended on skills, while organized agriculture led to centralized autocratic rule, the norm until recently.
With 54.1 percent of the world living in flawed or authoritarian states, the belief in democracy's natural spread is challenged by contemporary evidence.
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