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Session 1 — Navigating Democratic Backsliding Series: Insights from Research and Case Studies

In-Person Event

Ash Center Seminar Room 225, Suite 200, 124 Mount Auburn Street
3:00 pm – 4:00 pm EDT

Democratic backsliding has become a growing concern worldwide, affecting countries that were once considered stable democracies. While the process varies across regions, common patterns emerge—executive overreach, judicial capture, restrictions on civil liberties, and weakening democratic institutions. Some societies have successfully resisted backsliding, while others have struggled to contain it. What lessons can be learned from these experiences?

This four-part series gathers leading scholars and activists to examine the dynamics of democratic backsliding, and the strategies employed to resist it. The series will investigate, through comparative case studies and evidence-based research, how democracies decline, how opposition movements and institutions have reacted, and what insights can be drawn to protect democracy better. The discussions will also help frame an ongoing project at the Nonviolent Action Lab to develop strategies to counter democratic backsliding and strengthen resistance efforts worldwide.

 

Session Details

Pro-democracy Organizing against Autocracy: A Strategic Assessment & Recommendations

Event Details: Thursday, April 3rd from 3 – 4 PM (Ash Center Seminar Room 225)

This session will introduce key frameworks for analyzing democratic erosion and how to confront it, with a focus on the United States as a case study to contextualize broader trends. This session will be led by speakers Erica Chenoweth, Frank Stanton Professor of the First Amendment and Director of the Nonviolent Action Lab at the Ash Center, and Steven Levitsky, Professor of Government at Harvard University and co-author of How Democracies Die.

Paper link: “Pro-democracy Organizing Against Autocracy in the United States,” 2022 working paper authored by Erica Chenoweth and Zoe Marks.

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Learning from Others: Case Studies from Israel, Poland, and Hungary

Event Details: Thursday, April 10 from 3 – 4:30 PM (Democracy Lab 414-B)

This session will feature a conversation with speakers from Israel, Poland, and Hungary—each bringing extensive experience in public leadership, legal advocacy, and democratic defense.

Speakers include:

  • Naomi Beyth-Zoran, Israeli Educator and Lawyer; Visiting Democracy Fellow at the Ash Center
  • Kamila Gasiuk-Pihowicz, Member of the European Parliament (Poland); Vice-Chair of the Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection
  • András Kádár, Co-Chair of the Hungarian Helsinki Committee; Attorney-at-Law
  • Dana Schleifer, Research Fellow at the Taubman Center for State and Local Government; Former Chief Innovation Officer of Tel Aviv

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Learning from Others: Case Studies from India, Serbia, and Venezuela

Event Details: Thursday, April 17 from 3 – 4:30 PM (Ash Center Seminar Room 225)

This panel will explore resistance strategies in three countries facing intense democratic backsliding—India, Serbia, and Venezuela. Speakers will reflect on how political movements, civil society, and individual leadership have responded to growing authoritarianism, and what lessons can be learned from their experiences.

Speakers include:

  • Feyaad Allie, Assistant Professor in the Department of Government at Harvard University; studies democracy, identity, and political representation in South Asia; his work examines how inclusive political systems can be built in multi-ethnic societies, with a focus on India
  • Nikola Ilic, Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service; Founder of ChangeLab Global; supporter of pro-democracy movements in Serbia and globally; leads leadership development programs with major institutions including UNICEF and the Obama Foundation
  • Freddy Guevara, Former Vice president of Venezuela’s National Assembly; Democracy Fellow at the Ash Center and Researcher at the Nonviolent Action Lab

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Resisting Backsliding: Lessons from the Data for Effective Strategies

Event Details: Friday, April 25 from 9 – 10 AM (Ash Center Seminar Room 225)

This concluding session will feature Rachel Beatty Riedl, Director of Cornell University’s Center for Global Democracy, presenting findings from the Democratic Attacks and Resistance Events (DARE) Dataset, which analyzes the effectiveness of different resistance strategies. The session will be moderated by Archon Fung, Director of the Ash Center for Democratic Governance at Harvard, exploring what data-driven research tells us about how democracies fight back.

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Event Details

This seminar series will consist of four sessions. Attendees are not required to attend each session, but we strongly encourage those who are interested in contributing to the broader project to attend multiple discussions. Registration is required, and you must register individually for each session that you plan to attend. This seminar is in-person and open to Harvard ID holders. Please register using your Harvard email address.

Following the series, we will hold an additional discussion with those who have participated in most sessions to gather further input and collaboratively draft key lessons learned. This will help shape a broader effort to develop strategies for countering democratic backsliding as part of an ongoing project at the Nonviolent Action Lab.

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