#competitive-authoritarianism

#competitive-authoritarianism

The so-called troika of tyranny in Latin America, the dictatorships of Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, was always a misleading oversimplification. Despite sharing some common elements due to their authoritarian resilience, 21st-century dictatorships were never a homogeneous bloc.

"The news was both surprising and upsetting. Damascus has historically been a city that embraces everyone and diversity is its true identity. This decision makes us feel like we're losing a part of the city's open spirit. It's not just about the drink itself, but about freedom of choice."

Videos shared on social media show the protesters ransacking the office, removing documents, equipment and furniture, and burning everything in the street. A smaller group also threw stones. What began peacefully, after an exchange with the authorities in the area, degenerated into vandalism against the headquarters of municipal committee of the Communist party.

The Ministry of Territorial Administration and Decentralisation issued the decree late on Friday, citing the parties' failure to meet their legal obligations. Beyond stripping them of their legal status, the order froze their assets and banned the use of their names, logos and emblems, with a government-appointed curator assigned to oversee the transfer of their holdings.

In response to his sentencing following his conviction on 34 felonies in May 2024, President Trump stated that he had "won the election in a massive landslide, and the people of this country understand what's gone on. This has been a weaponization of government." Despite his conviction, Judge Juan Merchan sentenced him to an unconditional discharge with no consequences like prison, probation, or even fines.

The narratives they offer through culture are therefore some of the clearest expressions of how they see their role in a wartime country. This year, Moscow has hosted two major government-backed awards ceremonies one for books, one for films. In both cases, the organisers played it safe, repeating familiar themes, many of them rooted in Soviet-era cultural and wartime mythology. Prizes went largely to people within the same orbit in most cases, the families of well-known Soviet-era cultural icons.

As the United States heads toward the midterm elections, there are growing concerns among some political scientists that the country has moved even further along the path to some form of autocracy. Staffan I. Lindberg, the director of Sweden's V-Dem Institute, which monitors democracy across the globe, says the U.S. has already crossed the threshold and become an "electoral autocracy."

The United States intervention in Venezuela to abduct President Nicolas Maduro is not law enforcement extended beyond its borders. It is international vandalism, plain and unadorned. Power has displaced law, preference has replaced principle and force has been presented as virtue. This is not the defence of the international order. It is its quiet execution. When a state kidnaps the law to justify kidnapping a leader, it does not uphold order. It advertises contempt for it.

When we talk about our inability to pay attention, to concentrate, we often mean and blame our phones. It's easy, it's meant to be easy. One flick of our index finger transports us from disaster to disaster, from crisis to crisis, from maddening lie to maddening lie. Each new unauthorized attack and threatened invasion grabs the headlines, until something else takes its place, and meanwhile the government's attempts to terrorize and silence the people of our country continue.

Any lingering doubts about the true motives behind the 2003 invasion of Iraq were dispelled when looters were ransacking Baghdad, carrying off millennia-old artifacts from the Iraqi capital's archaeological museum, while U.S. troops fortified the Ministry of Oilthe only government building left untouched and from which not a single document emerged. The disastrous and illegal invasion, spearheaded by the United States with military support from the United Kingdom

Trying to isolate over 100 million users from private and secure communication is a backwards step and can only lead to less safety for people in Russia. We continue to do everything we can to keep users connected. The move fits into the Kremlin's aim to achieve a sovereign internet an online space cut off from western technology and foreign influence, and more vulnerable to state control.

He doesn't have an X account. He's not on Facebook. Nobody knows where he lives or what kind of life he leads. In fact, people don't have a clue who he is. I've never heard of him, says a bakery worker in Bauta, a municipality west of Havana. No idea who he is, a housewife from Pinar del Rio shrugs, when asked if she knows Oscar Perez-Oliva Fraga, the great-nephew of Fidel and Raul Castro.