International Day of Democracy

Today, 15 of September,  is the International Day of Democracy; proclaimed by the UN General Assembly the 8 of November of 2007.
Celebrations are welcomed but we have to think of the all the work that is still to be done. How many countries are actual democracies nowadays?
The concept of democracy has blurried barriers, thus in most of the cases it is difficult to determine whether we are in front of a real democracy or a system where only some aspects of democracy are taken in consideration.

The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU)  measures the state of democracy in 167 worldwide through the socalled "Democracy Index". Using 60 different indicators it rates the countries on a scale from 1 to 10. According to the index made public in 2013, only 25 countries can be considered as "full democracies", which embrace only 11.3% of the world's population; whilst 37 countries were deemed as "authoritarian regimes", controlling over 37% of the global population.

As a result of the Arab Spring and the consequent changes in regimes and the flourishment of new transitional goverments towards democracy, we could infer that democracy has undergo a big growth worldwide. But that would be a hasty assumption.
According to Laza Kekic, head of the EIU regional team, "In 2012 global democracy was at a standstill in the sense that there was neither significant progress nor regression in levels of democracy worldwide".

And why is that happening? The report attribute this cause to a diverse number of reasons. Most important and surprising reasons are due to new policies implemented by western countries. For instance the global financial recession that we are suffering since around 2007, have had as a result the designation of decision-making to unelected technocracts, instead of atributing them to democratically elected leaders. The most notable cases have taken place in the eurozone, where countries such as Italy, Ireland or Spain have carried out these policies.

Another main reason for the decline of democracy standards in western societies according to this report has been the sacrifice of certain civil rights, contraining them in the name of the maintenance of national security. Other countries are suffering a sharp decline of voters participation and keep fighting to maintain a democratic system. With countries like USA occupying the 21st position, or Belgium placed in the 24th position in the rank.

The good news are that comparing the EIU Democracy Index of 2012 the score increased for 54 ccountries. Among them, Libya experiences the biggest increase. And the Middle East and _North Africa countries increased their scores by more than a point, thanks to the transition from authoritarian to hybrid regimes of Libya, Egypt and Morocco.

If you still want to know more check the report's text at: https://portoncv.gov.cv/dhub/porton.por_global.open_file?p_doc_id=1034