Political science, not political science-fiction. A student-run magazine at Binghamton University.
In recent years, Türkiye’s political trajectory has become one of the most debated cases in comparative politics due to its rapid transformation from a democratically promising EU candidate to an increasingly authoritarian system. Academics, policymakers, and international observers have highlighted Türkiye as a critical example of how elected governments can gradually erode democratic institutions while maintaining formal electoral procedures.
The United States prides itself on democratic and egalitarian values. Despite this, we choose to elect our executive by means of an Electoral College, which due to its nature, sometimes produces antimajoritarian election outcomes. These results go against the wishes of a majority of voters.
On December 8th, 2024, the Syrian Ba’athist Party and the Assad political dynasty were exhumed from the Syrian administration after a grueling decade of civil war. Since the start of the Arab Spring in 2011, the president of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, waged an all-out war on the country’s political insurgents. The Arab Spring was a chain of protests across North Africa and the Middle East that demanded civic freedoms from their authoritarian governments, attempting to loosen autocratic regimes’ grip over their people.
As thick black smoke billows into the sky, the president’s forces stormed the Parliament to the sound of more gunfire. The political change is palpable; Russian democracy is dead, and while no one knows it yet, the path has been laid for a new unknown political actor named Vladimir Putin to take and hold power. We know how this story ends, but where does it begin and when did things go so terribly wrong?
The WGA Strike of 2023 will undoubtedly be remembered for many years to come. Not only did the union achieve improvements for American writers, but the outcome of the deal will be felt across the country.
The international plan to increase democracy has seemingly been the introduction of direct democratic items, such as referendums and initiatives, especially in cases of contentious policies or fundamental political changes. However, direct democratic components can be dangerous to democracy in all but a few cases.
By looking at failed American political parties, what they stood for, who made up their voter base, and why they fell, we can better understand our two-party system.
Representation, at its core, is defined as “a making present again” or “the making present in some sense of something which is nevertheless not present literally or in fact.” However, in a democratic sense, representation goes beyond the simplistically unrefined definition above.
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