We are living through a profound global referendum on democracy. In 2024, more than half the world’s population in over 70 countries will vote in elections. While the voting looks different from country to country, a troubling throughline has emerged.

Beyond the anti-incumbency results in South Africa, Poland, France and the United Kingdom, citizens around the world are exhibiting a serious skepticism of democracy itself. In April, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, an intergovernmental organization based in Stockholm, released findings from a survey of voters in 19 countries that showed widespread disaffection for the performance of democratic institutions and doubt about whether their elections are free and fair.

Data also shows established democracies slipping into autocracy at an alarming rate. The V-Dem Institute, an internationally based research organization with Notre Dame roots, is documenting global declines in freedom of expression, increases in government repression of civil-society organizations and worsening election conditions. A decade ago, many countries were experiencing improvements in all aspects of democracy that V-Dem measures. “By 2022,” its latest report notes, “the situation is completely overturned,” with the global level of democracy reverting to 1986 levels — before the fall of the Soviet Union.

In the United States, satisfaction with our democratic system is at record lows. A 2022 Notre Dame Health of Democracy Survey, issued by the Rooney Center for the Study of American Democracy, showed that a plurality of Americans sees the system as so broken that civil war lies within the realm of possibility.

Dangerous acts of political violence, which foreclose healthy dialogue and thrust the public from deliberation to panic, reinforce these perceptions and encourage our most reactionary demons.

Threats, harassment and attacks have become an unfortunate characteristic of the 2024 U.S. election season, with the attempted assassination of former president Donald Trump just one incident in a global surge. The speaker of the U.K.’s House of Commons said he had “never seen anything as bad” as the intimidation and harassment that local and national politicians faced during the summer election season. In France, more than 50 candidates and activists experienced physical attacks. Thirty candidates in Mexico were murdered.

The grip of political violence, social grievance and economic deprivation resulting from dysfunction and mismanagement is a perfect storm of circumstances in which autocrats may disparage democracy while offering a “secure” and “strong” authoritarian alternative. El Salvador’s recent re-election of the self-branded “world’s coolest dictator,” Nayib Bukele, showed the power of fear, violence, anger and grievance as a platform for autocrats intent on eroding basic rights and liberties to gain public support.

Governments must produce real, meaningful results for people, and countries with advanced economies and democratic forms of government have had a troubling track record of late. But abandoning liberal, pluralist democracy for some other means of decision-making is a hazardous road. If democracy doesn’t work, how can we fix any other problem?

The conditions of democracy set the foundation for preserving human dignity and working across differences toward the common good. Without the strong democratic institutions and norms by which we decide public-policy issues and protect civil liberties, we open a Pandora’s box of alternatives. To put the power in the hands of one religion, race, class or strongman invites inequality and domination.

The investment we make in democracy today will define the next 100 years of public policy. Notre Dame’s Democracy Initiative is one way our community is rising to meet this generational challenge. The initiative aims to establish Notre Dame as the leading institution for studying and strengthening democracy in the U.S. and around the world. By focusing our research, formation and convening efforts on democracy studies, Notre Dame may promote nothing short of generational democratic renewal.

As the nation’s leading faith-based research institution, Notre Dame is poised to be a leader in studying and strengthening democracy. Our Catholic identity gives us a duty to maximize human flourishing and dignity while helping publicly engaged citizens navigate the tensions between personal commitments and public welfare.

Our location in the Midwest, combined with our global reach, offers opportunities for practical solutions, perspectives and experiences that too often get lost in Beltway polarization. Perhaps most key, our civil, nonpartisan, rigorous scholarship on democracy is a part of our institutional DNA. In addition to the anchoring work of the Kellogg Institute for International Studies and the Rooney Center, Notre Dame boasts dozens of other existing programs, centers and faculty working on issues related to democratic culture and institutions and religious freedom — a breadth and depth that’s distinctive in higher education. Together, these features position Notre Dame to be a leader in meeting the challenge of global democratic decline and skepticism.

Democratic renewal is contingent on institutions like Notre Dame playing a leadership role. A world reeling from political violence and extreme polarization requires a convening place for serious, safe discussions where human dignity is centered as a transcendent value. The next generation of public servants must be formed with a commitment to democracy as the process for decision-making.

When politics gives way to conspiracy theories and ad hominem attacks, strengthening democracy means doubling down on data, facts and evidence as the shared bedrock for civil dialogue. Fixing democracy requires renewed commitment from trusted institutions to invest in research, form students and convene civic leaders in a way that transcends polarization.

Through this sort of investment in the foundations of our collective decision- making, we can begin to push back against the democratic backslide and lead instead an era of democratic renewal, in America and around the world.

Joel Day is the managing director of the Notre Dame Democracy Initiative.

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Originally published by Joel Day at rooneycenter.nd.edu on November 01, 2024.