Thomas Carothers is director of Carnegie’s Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program.
Carothers is a leading authority on comparative democratization and international support for democracy, human rights, governance, the rule of law, and civil society. He has worked on democracy assistance projects for many organizations and carried out extensive field research on aid efforts around the world.
He is the author or editor of ten critically acclaimed books and many articles in prominent journals and newspapers, including most recently, Democracies Divided: The Global Challenge of Political Polarization (Brookings Press, 2019, co-edited with Andrew O'Donohue). He has been a visiting faculty member at the Central European University, Nuffield College, Oxford University, and Johns Hopkins SAIS.
Prior to joining the Endowment, Carothers practiced international and financial law at Arnold & Porter and served as an attorney adviser in the office of the legal adviser of the U.S. Department of State.
Despite a favorable political environment in recent years on both sides of the Atlantic for close European-U.S. cooperation on international democracy support, only policy convergence has been achieved.
Democracies are divided
Responding to rising autocratic assertiveness and an ongoing democratic recession, the Biden administration has advanced multiple new policy and aid initiatives to support democracy globally. An examination of its efforts reveals six main elements, each of which embodies a complex mix of promising opportunities and nagging dilemmas.
Through its efforts to counter the geostrategic reach of China and Russia, the Biden administration aims to defend democracy globally.
This year’s global elections present a panoply of political contexts and issues at stake.
Political overreach, economic pain, and violent conflicts drive another year of surging protests.
Relations between the United States and many undemocratic countries around the world vary widely from cozy to conflictive. Understanding the drivers and evolving dynamics of these relationships is vital to grasping the realities of U.S. foreign policy in an age of sharp geostrategic competition.
Despite some recent democratic gains, it is too early to declare that the global democratic recession is over. Overcoming the deep roots of democracy’s global woes will require sustained efforts by the United States and many other democracies to address a myriad of continuing challenges
Leaders agreed that the Summit for Democracy process will continue to improve coordination among democracies. If the EU is to prove its credibility and effectiveness, concrete actions are needed in the months ahead.
Leaving aside the fact that the United States has not in recent memory exhibited much shame in prioritizing its interests globally, the problem with this formulation is that the strength of an ally’s democracy is often connected with U.S. security interests.