When tanks rolled through Myanmar’s city streets in 2021, civil society groups worldwide sounded the alarm. When Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán systematically dismantled media freedoms while maintaining European Union membership, democracy activists demanded international action. And as authoritarianism returns to Tanzania ahead of elections, it’s once again civil society calling for democratic freedoms to be respected.

Around the world, authoritarian populists have learned to maintain democratic language and rituals but gut its substance, including by holding fraudulent elections with no real opposition and cracking down on civil society when it tries to uphold democratic freedoms. As a result, more than 70 per cent of the world’s population lives in countries where civic space is routinely repressed.

In response, over 175 civil society organisations and more than 500 activists have united behind a demand to help improve respect for democratic freedoms: they’re calling on the United Nations (UN) to establish a Special Rapporteur on Democracy.

The proposal isn’t coming from diplomatic corridors or academia; it’s a grassroots call from the frontlines of a global democratic struggle. Democracy defenders who face harassment, imprisonment and violence have identified a gap in international oversight that emboldens authoritarians and lets down those fighting for democratic rights when they most need support.

While the UN investigates everything from torture to toxic waste through specialised rapporteurs, democracy – supposedly a core UN principle – receives no systematic international oversight. Civil society wants to change that.

Critical blind spots

Today’s threats to democracy are often more subtle than outright coups and blatant election rigging. Repressive leaders have mastered the art of legal authoritarianism, using constitutional amendments to extend term limits, judicial re-engineering to capture courts and media laws to silence critics, all while maintaining a facade of democratic governance.

In countries from Belarus to Venezuela, elections have been turned into elaborate ceremonies emptied of competition. Even established democracies face growing challenges, with foreign influence and disinformation campaigns documented across dozens of recent elections, often amplified by AI that creates deepfakes faster than fact-checkers can debunk them. The rise of right-wing populism across Europe and in the USA demonstrates how democratic processes can elevate leaders who systematically undermine democratic norms from within, using legal frameworks to concentrate executive authority, criminalise opposition and restrict civic space.

These evolving threats expose fundamental gaps in how the international community monitors and responds to democratic decline. The proposed UN Special Rapporteur on Democracy would address the blind spots of existing mechanisms: unlike current mandates that focus on specific rights, this role would examine how democratic systems function as a whole.

Existing UN Special Rapporteurs have recognised the urgent need for dedicated democracy oversight, with the Special Rapporteurs on freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, freedom of opinion and expression, and the independence of judges and lawyers highlighting how democratic backsliding undermines the rights they’re mandated to protect.

A democracy rapporteur could investigate the full spectrum of threats that escape current international attention: how electoral systems become compromised through legal manipulation and administrative capture, how parliamentary oversight gets systematically weakened while maintaining constitutional appearances, how judicial independence is eroded through seemingly legitimate reforms and political appointments, and how meaningful participation beyond elections gets stifled through bureaucratic restrictions and legal constraints.

Crucially, the mandate could document not just obvious authoritarian crackdowns but the subtler forms of democratic erosion that often escape international notice until democratic institutions are already fatally compromised, offering early warnings about the gradual processes that transform vibrant democracies into hollow shells that retain democratic language without democratic substance.

Legal foundations

The proposal builds on solid legal foundations and would draw directly on existing UN resolutions and international instruments, without the need to agree on any new ones: article 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights establishes that ‘public authority must derive from the will of the people’, while article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights recognises every citizen’s right and opportunity to take part in the conduct of public affairs, vote and be elected at genuine periodic elections by universal suffrage and secret ballot.

Regional mechanisms that recognise democracy as a fundamental right provide valuable precedents for global action. The Inter-American Democratic Charter, adopted in 2001 by the Organization of American States, the regional political body for the Americas, explicitly states that ‘the peoples of the Americas have a right to democracy and their governments have an obligation to promote and defend it’. This document has been repeatedly invoked to address threats to democratic governance.

Over the years, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) has issued advisory opinions to establish criteria on the relationship between democracy and human rights, including a 2021 advisory opinion that concluded that indefinite presidential re-election can undermine democracy.

Building on this, Guatemala has recently requested an IACtHR consultative opinion to clarify whether democracy constitutes a human right that states are obliged to guarantee and promote under the American Convention on Human Rights, and if so, what obligations this creates for states. This initiative, which has invited written observations from interested organisations and individuals until July, could establish vital precedents in the recognition of democracy as a fundamental right.

These foundations provide an actionable definition of democracy that respects diverse democratic models while upholding universal principles, sidestepping cultural relativist arguments that some authoritarian governments use to avoid accountability. The new rapporteur would examine common challenges around the world and identify best practices rather than imposing one-size-fits-all solutions.

The way forward

The proposal has generated remarkable momentum that demonstrates the urgent need felt by people working to defend democracy. On the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on 10 December 2023, this broad coalition of civil society groups and think tanks published a joint statement calling for the appointment of a UN Special Rapporteur on Democracy.

This civil society leadership reflects widespread frustration among democracy activists, many of whom work under increasingly dangerous conditions and are demanding better institutional responses. Their voices deserve to be heard, particularly as they often risk their safety to defend democratic principles.

Budget-conscious states should find this proposal attractive given the remarkable cost-effectiveness of the UN mandates system compared to other approaches. Following standard UN practice, the position would be unpaid, although supportive states would need to provide voluntary funding to ensure the rapporteur can fully carry out their responsibilities. With the UN currently undergoing a funding crisis that is hitting its human rights system hard, expanding the Special Procedures system is one of the few ways to strengthen oversight without breaking budgets. The flexibility built into these mandates allows for creative approaches to complex problems that traditional bureaucratic structures can’t match.

A positive step for democratic resilience

No one initiative will reverse a global pattern of democratic decline. But the new role would enable systematic documentation, trend spotting and sustained international attention that democracy defenders desperately need in their struggles against authoritarianism.

The rapporteur could investigate not just obvious authoritarian crackdowns but also the early signs of subtler forms of democratic erosion that often escape attention until they reach crisis point. These include the gradual weakening of electoral institutions, the slow strangulation of parliamentary oversight and the creeping expansion of executive power. Currently, by the time these processes become visible to international observers, democratic institutions may already be fatally compromised.

Equally important, the mandate would highlight innovations and good practices alongside failures. Some countries are pioneering creative approaches to civic engagement, electoral integrity and governmental accountability that others could adapt. The rapporteur could facilitate this kind of positive learning while building networks of democratic practitioners worldwide.

During its recent 58th session, the UN Human Rights Council adopted a resolution on human rights, democracy and the rule of law, conferring multilateral legitimacy on governments that want to support stronger democracy oversight. The window for action is open, but it won’t stay open indefinitely.

The debate over a UN Special Rapporteur on Democracy offers a test of whether international institutions are capable of adapting to contemporary challenges or will remain trapped in outdated approaches while democracy crumbles. The creation of this mandate would communicate that the international community takes democratic governance seriously enough to monitor it systematically – a signal that matters to democracy activists who need international support and would serve as a warning to authoritarian leaders who thrive when nobody is watching.

With hundreds of civil society groups leading this charge from the frontlines of democratic struggle, the question isn’t whether this oversight is needed, but whether the UN will act before it’s too late.

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