Donald Trump’s authoritarian drift in his second term places the country on a par with Hungary or Turkey, according to a ranking by Sweden’s V-Dem Institute
Democratic backsliding is advancing in the developed world. The annual report from Sweden’s V-Dem Institute leaves no room for doubt: almost a quarter of the world experienced democratic backsliding, or a shift towards autocratization, in 2025, and six of the 10 newly regressive countries identified in the research are located in Europe and North America, including G-7 powers such as Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
But the most unsettling conclusion reached by the Swedish institute is that the United States — once a proud beacon of the more or less free world — is no longer a liberal democracy and is now on a par with countries like Hungary or Turkey, thanks to President Donald Trump. Autocracy is also spreading throughout Europe, but its reach extends far beyond the Old Continent: 41% of the world’s population (3.4 billion people) now live in countries where democracy is eroding.
The institute, which belongs to the University of Gothenburg and uses 48 metrics in its evaluation, is one of the most reliable sources when it comes to rating the state of governments around the world, and the conclusion of its 2026 study confirms the worst fears about the authoritarian drift of the U.S. under Trump’s leadership.
When you put it that way, it sounds like democracy requires a global effort to continuously thwart such collusion, such wealth, maybe such exclusively? Something… It sounds righteous to me, but also like something that can become equally oppressive in perhaps many different ways.
What you describe is something that I understand to have been the case for most of human history, if not all of it. How do you resolve that issue? And, if that’s really the issue, what do you make of modern democracies?
Democracy grew out of too much power to the rich, though since day one they’ve been thwarting it where they can.
I honestly don’t have real answers for this, I just know of the problem.