The latest edition of Freedom House’s "Nations in Transit" report, its 26th, highlights a concerning decline in democratic governance across 10 countries in 2023. This year's findings continue a two-decade trend, marking the 20th consecutive year that the political advocacy and human rights organization has reported such a decline.
Freedom House's analysis, as detailed in their press release, encompasses a region of 29 countries stretching from Central Europe to Central Asia. The latest report indicates that apart from the 10 countries that witnessed declines in their overall Democracy Score, only five countries saw an improvement.
Michael J. Abramowitz, president of Freedom House, expressed concern over these developments. "Authoritarian regimes are stepping up their attacks and undermining democratic governance across the region," Abramowitz said. He pointed out the severe consequences already visible in Ukraine and Nagorno-Karabakh due to authoritarian expansion and warned that this trend shows no signs of stopping. "Unless democracies act urgently and consistently to uphold their own interests and values, more territory will be lost to dictatorship and repression," he added.
The report also classified eight countries as Consolidated Authoritarian Regimes where autocrats frequently suppress political competition and pluralism through widespread violations of basic rights. According to the press release from Freedom House, four out of these eight countries - Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Uzbekistan - experienced declines in their Democracy Scores which were already at low levels.
Serbia’s Democracy Score suffered the most significant drop according to the same press release. The score now stands at 3.61 due to factors such as fraudulent elections, state capture of media outlets, weakening authority of municipal governments, and years of diminishing judicial independence. However, Turkmenistan (1.00), Tajikistan (1.04), Azerbaijan (1.07), and Russia (1.07) were identified as having the lowest scores in the region.
Freedom House has been publishing the "Nations in Transit" report annually since 1995. The 26th edition covers events that took place from January 1 to December 31, 2023.
