With an increase in both volume and sophistication of mass dissent against a draconian government, the Philippines is part of a rising global trend. With the crackdown on activists and media outlets being stepped up and even enshrined into law, the Philippines is part of another rising global trend.
Democracy is in flux all over the world. The COVID-19 pandemic has, in many ways, been a double-edged sword. On the one hand, the pandemic has given governments an excuse to ban mass gatherings, insulating them from any protest action and allowing them to railroad any repressive policies. On the other, the pandemic greatly affected the masses worldwide, which served as fuel for more creative and more intense anti-government action.
Countries all over the world have faced huge social upheaval. Some of them are the site of increased control under authoritarian, often populist, governments. Others are the setting of massive movements for social change and democracy. Where do countries around the world find themselves in this constant push and pull between the people and the government that should represent them?
Conceptual overview: Democracy and democratic backsliding
While democracy has remained a contested concept for thousands of years, modern conceptions often center around a few, intuitive elements. Dahl (1982) sums up seven of these in his “procedural minimal” definition, which appear in one way or another in many other texts that attempts to define democracy:
Control over government decisions is vested in elected officials;
Officials are chosen in freely, fairly conducted elections with the absence of coercion;
Practically all adults have the right to vote;
Practically all adults have the right to run for office;
Citizens have the right to express themselves without danger of being punished;
Alternative sources of information exist and are protected, and citizens have the right to seek information from them;
Citizens have the right to organize into independent associations.
Similarly, non-democracies are diverse in type, from single-party regimes, to personalistic regimes to military regimes (Geddes, Wright, & Frantz, 2014). Nevertheless, all of these regime types are often associated with the violation of democratic principles, specifically the people’s right to fully participate in their governance. Terms such as autocracy are often used to denote the power of the state being vested in a single ruler, while terms such as totalitarianism often refer to the extent and scope of the state’s power (Linz, 2000). There are clear variations between the terms used, but they both imply a lack of popular participation.
In the past year, the push and pull between democratic rule and non-democratic rule have been an active dynamic worldwide. These ten cases serve as a mere snapshot into a year of protest, repression, and general social upheaval.
Democratic Backsliding
Hong Kong: China’s continued crackdown on pro-democracy activism
When the first of the latest wave of pro-democracy protests erupted in Hong Kong in 2019, it seemed like the protesters were ready to fight until they won. The demonstrations grew in both numbers and sophistication, with participants using encrypted messaging, supply chains, and even laser pointers to subvert police efforts to disperse the crowds.
The pandemic, however, has emboldened the Chinese state machinery to railroad crackdown measures that would have met stronger resistance if not for COVID-19. Last March 2021, a law was passed that would only allow “patriots,” or those who pledged their allegiance to the mainland, to serve in Hong Kong’s parliament, while April 1 of the same year saw seven pro-democracy activists charged with sedition.
Myanmar: Open violent engagements between military and civilians
It did not take long for the Myanmar military to crack down on the inevitable civilian unrest following the coup d’etat at the beginning of February 2021. The military used live ammunition as early as February 9, and since then, the killings have not stopped. On March 3, the military used submachine guns to massacre protesters. On March 28, a funeral for the 114 protesters killed in a single day was disrupted by the military opening fire once more.
Military leaders had told ASEAN that the violence would only end when “order was restored” to the country while slapping the detained civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi with charge after charge. However, this has not stopped the protesters, with civilians fighting the military with firebombs and homemade guns last April 8 and declaring a “unity government” with Suu Kyi as state counsellor last April 16.
Iran: Internet blackouts limit dissent against the government
Iranians have had many reasons to protest against Ali Khamenei’s clerical regime: from the poor handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, to the poor economic situation and questionable trade deals with China, and to the shooting of oil traders from Baluchistan last February. The government, however, has relied on a tactic it has used for many years: the internet shutdown.
After an Internet shutdown concealed a crackdown and the killing of 304 people in late 2019, the Iranian government uses the same tactic to hide human rights abuses and prevent demonstrators from organizing. In the economically poor region of Sistan and Baluchistan, where over 95% of people rely on the Internet, the government has had no hesitation in restricting access, if only to hide its atrocities.
Russia: Continued attacks on all of Putin’s opposition
Among the many things that have characterized Russian president Vladimir Putin’s regime, targeted attacks on the opposition have always been a critical component. Most notable in the past year has been the situation of Alexei Navalny, an opposition activist. He was nearly killed by a chemical nerve agent (which he blames on Putin) and has been on hunger strike for over 20 days protesting a lack of medical care.
But the Russian state’s attacks have not been limited to prominent individual figureheads. Last March 2021, state forces broke up an opposition election forum because it was organized by an “undesirable organization,” while there are reported plans to declare Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation as an extremist organization.
Hungary: Orban uses emergency powers to disenfranchise opposition
Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orban has long been known for making efforts to remove roadblocks to his power; the law requiring civil society organizations to register with the government that was in place until recently is a key example. The pandemic has only exacerbated this, with the lack of the possibility for popular protest allowing Orban to railroad more controversial laws.
Most notable among these has been the declaration of a state of emergency that allowed Orban to rule by decree from March to June of 2020, which Orban has asked to reinstate as recently as February 2021. Meanwhile, the pandemic has not slowed the government’s crackdown on the media, with independent radio station Klubradio being pulled off the air last February.
Pro-Democracy Protests
Senegal: Arrest of opposition leader leads to widest protests in decades
In early March 2021, Senegalese opposition leader Ousmane Sonko was charged with rape and disrupting public order. As Sonko is the last remaining source of credible opposition to nine-year president Macky Sall, his arrest fueled the anger in Senegal’s citizens, who have responded with massive protests and civil disobedience.
The protests were framed in the context of the 2024 elections, where Sall might seek to extend his mandate with a third term. Sall is already known to elbow political opposition out of the way, most notably with the corruption charges against Karim Wade, another former opposition figurehead.
However, it is important to note that while the protests have evolved into much more than demanding Sonko’s freedom (as he was freed in the middle of March), the rape case that sparked the issue remains unresolved.
The United States: #BlackLivesMatter and #DefundThePolice
By now, their names and stories are powerful indictments against the state of policing and police violence in the United States. But the deaths of Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, and Daunte Wright were nonetheless horrifying incidents that threw back the curtain on the systemic issues with racism and policing in a country that has struggled with those issues for hundreds of years.
The response to these killings was swift and massive. Demonstrations quickly turned violent after police used the same violence that was being protested against, against the protesters. The rallying cry #BlackLivesMatter, conceived in 2013, gained more traction than ever before, with protests erupting in Belgium, Brazil, South Korea, Liberia, and many more countries worldwide. It was joined this time by a radical call: #DefundThePolice.
Brazil: Right and left uniting against Bolsonaro’s failed COVID-19 response
Jair Bolsonaro, elected president of Brazil in 2018, had a pandemic response similar to another, more orange leader who was elected further north two years earlier. He insisted on calling COVID-19 a “little flu,” continues to reject vaccines from other countries, and has contracted COVID-19 three times himself. Brazil, meanwhile, continues to record tens of thousands of new cases and thousands of deaths per day.
The sheer ineptitude of the response has managed to unite both the Right and the Left against Bolsonaro, with groups on both sides organizing protests calling for his ouster. Protesters have clashed against Bolsonaro’s remaining supporters in the streets of Sao Paulo, while Bolsonaro continues to defy mask requirements and call for an end to lockdown measures.
India: Massive general strike mobilizing over 250 million workers
Last November 26, 2020, India was the stage for what has been called the biggest general strike in history. With over 250 million Indian workers downing tools and paralyzing society, the protesters called for, among other things, the withdrawal of anti-farmer laws and anti-worker labor codes, an end to the privatization of the public sector, greater economic support in the forms of monetary and food assistance, and the expansion of workers’ protections.
At the center of it all was Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP, who were guilty of passing the burden of many of India’s biggest problems to the private sector. Such certainly showed in the brutal way that they had treated dissenters and workers up to that point. The situation in India is much different now as it continues to buckle under the weight of COVID-19. Still, it is clear to see that the issues that dominated the general strike are what caused the situation in the present day.
Indonesia: Protests against anti-worker Omnibus Law
In a prime example of a government seeking to respond to a global crisis by allowing the entry of foreign capital at the expense of almost everything else, Indonesia has seen widespread protests against the Omnibus Job Creation Law, signed into effect last October, span from January 2020 to April 2021. Thousands continue to take to the streets to protest the law, which reads like a litany of crimes against workers and the environment.
The law limits the requirement for environmental regulations to a select few companies, leaving the most profitable ones free to continue business as usual. Additionally, the law scraps the workers’ benefits such as severance pay and regulations on the minimum wage. Even after sixteen months, it is no wonder that opposition to the law continues to rage.
Conclusion
The events of the last year are nothing new. Democracy has always been in a constant state of change worldwide, between governments seeking to assert control and citizens striving to get their voice heard. The pandemic, however, has added motivation and impetus to both sides: to governments that want to seize the opportunity to consolidate their rule, and to the people that the pandemic has hit the hardest.
The only certainty in this world is change, and there’s no telling how any of the tensions cited here will be resolved, nor where other tensions might arise in the future. No matter how the dynamics play out and how each side moves in response to the other, we must always remember that these events affect the lives of millions of people. It is, indeed, the world’s most crucial tug-of-war.
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