Democracy Tracker
See Democracy Clearly, Act Decisively
October Event Reports
Each report describes an event that affects the state of democracy in a given country, with assessments made relative to that country's context, not as comparisons or rankings between countries.
A concise analysis
explaining what happened and why it matters.
Hundreds of significant events tracked and analysed monthly.
Measuring Representation, Rights, Rule of Law and Participation.
From evidence to action
Brief, accessible insights to support targeted and timely responses.
Filter by level of impact
Malaysia
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In the Spotlight
Chosen for their standout relevance in the regional or global landscape.
Military takes power as President Rajoelina is impeached
Sanae Takaichi becomes Japan’s first woman to serve as prime minister
Millions take part in ‘No Kings’ protest
Parliament approves definition of rape based on consent
Democracy Mapper
Visualise Democracy Tracker data using our interactive map.
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See countries with elections in the selected year
Understanding the Democracy Tracker
The Democracy Tracker monitors key democratic developments by focusing on events that point to meaningful changes or potential shifts in the status quo. Only events closely related to the categories, factors or subfactors in the Global State of Democracy Indices conceptual framework are included.
Learn more about the different types of reports we produce below.
Standard Event Reports
Standard reports track events whose impact on democracy can be assessed in terms of direction and magnitude. Indicators are coded at two levels:
Primary impact
The quality of these indicators are directly and significantly impacted by the event in a specific month.
Primary indicators are coded by level of impact, from exceptionally positive to exceptionally negative.
Secondary impact
These indicators are relevant to the event but are not directly impacted by it.
Secondary indicators are always coded as neutral.
It is rare but possible for a single event to have different directional impacts across multiple factors within the same category.
See All Standard ReportsTo Watch Reports
In some cases, recent events have not yet reached the threshold of significant change required for a standard report, but there is reason to believe that an ongoing process may reach that level within a year. These reports are always coded as neutral, as their full impact has not yet materialised.
See All Events To WatchNational Election Reports
Elections are at the core of contemporary democratic practice and are always reported in the Democracy Tracker. Neutral event reports are written for every national election, providing factual descriptions of official results and other key data.
The neutrality of election reports means they do not include coding of the direction or magnitude of any impact of the election on the quality of democracy in the country.
See All Election ReportsThis flag is applied to notably egregious events that represent severe and exceptional threats to democracy or human rights, including coups d'état, assassinations of politicians or credible reports of mass atrocities.
The red flag is applied to events regardless of whether their impacts are immediate (Standard Event Reports) or longer-term (To Watch Reports).
See All Red Flagged EventsOur sources
We gather data from local and international news media, primary sources and other expert publications, combining global reach with local depth:
Local and Primary Sources
Including information from our regional offices, networks of local partners, court rulings, legislation and expert reports.
Nexis Newsdesk
Monitors 100,000+ media outlets in 100+ languages, across nearly every country and region.
The GDELT Project
A live global database tracking and classifying news events in 100 languages, updated every 15 minutes.
Hungry for more details?
Democracy Tracker insights are complementary to the GSoD Indices and do not affect their annual scores.
See the GSoD IndicesStay Informed, Stay Empowered
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