This brief policy paper distils the thoughts of several experts and presents five key indicators of democratic health during COVID-19.

This report compares Australia’s democracy with other nations over four issues: trust, concern about corruption, strength of democratic standards and the depth of liberal values.

Freedom House has found that 2019 was the 14th consecutive year of decline in global freedom. The gap between setbacks and gains widened compared with 2018, as individuals in 64 countries experienced deterioration in their political rights and civil liberties while those in just 37 experienced improvements.

To the extent that perceptions of a crisis in liberal democracy in Europe can be confirmed, this paper investigates the nature of the problem and its causes, and asks what part, if any, digital technology plays in it.

Democracy has many advantages, but its pitfalls include a tendency toward short-term return over longer-term interests, being reactive rather than proactive, and being geared towards internal competition rather than cooperation. This report argues that this is a key problem facing liberal democracies.