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Indiana University South Bend is proud to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU) non-partisan American Democracy Project by recommitting to the initiatives guiding principles of civic and democratic engagement.

IU South Bend is one of more than 250 campuses nationwide participating in this national initiative, which has equipped college students and the public with the knowledge and skills necessary to be informed and engaged citizens and to participate actively in representative democracy.

ADP works to:

We continue to lead by example and advocate for the kind of electoral engagement and civic mindedness the program embodies, said Elizabeth Bennion, IU South Bends ADP Director. From encouraging voting and promoting community dialogues to developing the civic skills that stimulate critical thinking and action, IU South Bend is committed to preparing our students to lead for future generations.

Relying on the work of student Democracy Fellows from diverse partisan and ideological backgrounds, the IU South Bend American Democracy Project partners with other campus and community organizations to promote civic and political engagement initiatives. The group welcomes involvement and ideas from community leaders, local political officials, and non-partisan civic organizations.

College and university leaders are committed to advancing thoughtful and constructive dialogue rather than polarized debate, said Cathy Copeland, American Democracy Project director.

ADP at IU South Bend hosts a wide range of voter education events including candidate debates and forums for local, state, and national offices. Candidates are also encouraged to participate in the ONLINE VOTER GUIDE (vote411.org) co-sponsored by the League of Women Voters of the South Bend Area.

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Indiana University South Bend joins American Democracy Project in celebrating 20 years of advancing democratic ... - IU Newsroom

When democracy works and the values of all people are reflected in decisions, water, wildlife, and landscapes are safeguarded. When a narrower group of wealthy interests are the only ones with a seat at the table, these values are degraded. Oregon Wild believes in a functioning and healthy representative democracy for all; one in which people power matters more than the power of money. Oregonians deserve fair elections and leaders who listen to them before listening to big donors.

That's why we're excited to welcome Tribal Democracy Project to learn about their vital work to engage in civics education in Tribal Communities, address issues of Native vote disenfranchisement, promote electoral reforms rooted in racial equity, and uplift Native candidates for public office. Though a relatively new organization, they're already making a positive impact.

In this webcast, co-founders Brian and Jaylyn talk about the mission, vision, and scope of their organization, Tribal Democracy Project, and their top priorities for this year and beyond. Their presentation includes Tribal Democracy Project's philosophy on electoral reforms, including redistricting and ranked-choice voting efforts, a discussion of ceded lands, Tribal treaty rights and land acknowledgments, and an overview of their upcoming Warm Springs Civics workshop series.

We have included some resources for further reading and learning. You can alsofind more resources on our Oregon Wildlandacknowledgmentpage.

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Webcast: Strengthening Our Democracy: Insights from Tribal Democracy Project - Oregon WildBlog

Sometimes it feels like we keep hearing the same gloomy news. Study after study shows signs of declining support for democracy in Latin America as its citizens find themselves wooed by populists, frustrated with their economic prospects, and worn out by crime and violence. Just 41 percent of Latin Americans are satisfied with democracy, down 16 points from a little over a decade ago, according to the 2023 AmericasBarometer study.

When it comes to the regions younger voters, the findings appear even more dire. Latin Americans under 36 are more likely to tolerate military coups and less likely to trust elections than older citizens. Thats set off alarm bells about the regions long-term commitment to democracy.

But there may be reasons for hope. It actually turns out that today's young generation is a little bit more committed to democracy than the youth of 20, 25, 30 years ago were when they were the same age, says Associate Director of Vanderbilt Universitys LAPOP Lab and Associate Professor of Political Science Noam Lupu. He is also editor of the 2023 AmericasBarometer report. While research often compares views of younger voters to those of older ones, the AmericasBarometer survey has been conducted biannually for nearly 20 years, allowingn for a comparison of young citizens views over time. The latest edition also finds that 18 to 25 years-olds are second only to respondents 66 and over when it comes to being satisfied with democracy.

In the case of Mexico, young voters are about to play a major role in charting the political future of their country, where there will be more than 20,000 seats up for grabs in June 2 elections. Campaigns officially kick off on March 1, and there are close to 48 million voters under 40, meaning nearly half of the countrys electorate. Thats more people than the entire population of any of the other five Latin American countries slated to hold presidential elections this year.

But they need to vote if they want to have an impact. Me Veo, an organization focused on getting out the vote in this election, is seeking to do just that. Alexandra Zapata, Me Veos director, told AS/COA Onlines Carin Zissis that one obstacle to getting younger generations to participate is that candidates target messaging to the older voters they think will show up. I think what would be extraordinaryand the way we can increase voter participation in June of 2024is if campaigns turn and look at young voters and what they're concerned about, says Zapata.

This is the second episode in our special series focused on 2024 elections in Latin America. The first explored El Salvadors expat votes and Nayib Bukeles global reach.

Share and subscribe at Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts to catch future episodes. Is there a topic youd like to see us cover? Send us feedback at latamfocus@as-coa.org.

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LatAm in Focus: As Mexico's Election Fires Up, a Look at Youth and Democracy - AS/COA Online

c/o Rose Chen, News Editor

The University hosted the Democracy in ActionConveningon Friday, Feb. 16 and Saturday, Feb. 17. The conventionwhichfeatured perspectives from students, faculty, and others on the connections between activism, media, and education in shaping democracy todaywas a workinprogressfor a long time, with the University promoting it through emails, posters, and social media campaigns. Events included workshops, panels, and a dinner reception.

In the early afternoon on Friday, students took part in a media literacy workshop led by Associate Professor of Government Logan Dancey, who teaches courses on data-forward approaches to political science and polarization in America.

It was very hands-on, Nicole Allina 24 said. We actually took three different claims [that were] put on Twitter and analyzed them, which I thought was an interesting way to put ideals into practice.

The workshop was followed by the Civic Action Fair, which showcased political and social activism on campus. Community members, students, faculty, and staff alike could be seen floating between tables staffed by studentgroups in the lobby of Exley Science Center.Participating organizations includedthe Wesleyan Center for Prison Education, Wesleyan Democratic Socialists of America, the Environmental Solidarity Network, and Cultivating Justice,whichis hosting the Growing Power 2024 workshop series on Saturday, Feb. 24. Also in attendance were representatives from theJewett Center for Community Partnerships, whopromoted voter registration andfacilitated the event.

Zoe Hecht26 explained that the fair allowed civic groups on campus to connect with oneanother, as well as to find potential new members and collaborators.

I was able to talk directly to other Wes students and faculty about Cultivating Justice and the upcoming Growing Power workshop series, Hecht said.

Michael Eric Dysonan academic, author, and activist who has written and edited over 25 booksdelivered the keynote address. His work covers topics from hip hop to civil rights, buthis speechfocused on the connection between higher educationand democratic values.

As bad as that is, the deep roots of anti-democracy in our nation[are] what we have to confront, Dyson said.How we got where we are [is an] unresolved tensionat the heart of the American project.

The day concluded with a dinner reception in Beckham Hall, at which event attendees and speakers mingled andengaged in topical conversations.

Saturdays session featured panels on civic education, art and activism, and media and democracy.The day started with a civic education panel moderated by Assistant Professor of Education Studies Alisha Butler.

c/o Rose Chen, News Editor

The following civic engagement panel featured Clinical Practice Department Chair and Curriculum Designer at Relay Graduate School of Education Challa Flemming 02; Presidential Professor for Education Policy and Politics and Co-Director of the Civic Engagement Research Group at the University of California, Riverside Joseph Kahne 86; Chair of Urban Studies and Professor of Political Science at the City University of New York Celina Su 99; and President of the Institute for Citizens & Scholars Rajiv Vinnakota.

The panelists stressed the importance of engagement at both the local and national levels, a topic that Vinnakota has special access tothrough his work at the Institute for Citizens & Scholars, an organization that promotes a network of ideologically diverse changemakers across the country.

Once you recognize that citizen development is much more than just voting, or just being able to pass a test on the immigration or naturalization test for someone, or so forth, [one] very quickly recognizes that it is a community responsibility, Vinnakota said.

All panelists reaffirmed the importance of civic engagement in combating threats to free speech. Flemmingwho has done research in both academic and professional contexts onteaching practices, and who wrote a dissertation exploring antiracist teacher preparationemphasized thatwe must understand our systems in orderto changethem.

We need to understand the historical underpinnings of democracy and the ability to think critically and engage with multiple sources and make sense of [them], and there are very real forces that are trying to prevent those things from happening, Flemming said in response to recent attacks on intellectual freedoms in higher education.

The art and activism panel featured a screening hosted by Associate Professor of Film Studies and Co-Director of the Wesleyan Documentary Project Tracy Heather Strain, who teaches courses on documentary storytelling and the history of documentary filmmaking at Wesleyan. The panel considered the relationship between visual art and student change-making.

Later in the day, the media and democracypanel brought together Associate Provost for Faculty Affairs and Professor of Political Science at Quinnipiac University Khalilah Brown-Dean,Executive Director at the Eisenhower Institute at Gettysburg Tracie Potts, and Molly Jong-Fast, host of the podcast Fast Politics With Molly Jong-Fast.

The panel stressed the need for local voices to be heard. According to her Quinnipiac website, Brown-Dean is a sought-after commentatorwhose work appears in over 400 major media outlets. She spoke from her experience on how the loss of non-national outlets has caused conversations to become stratified and depersonalized.

That loss of local media, local journalism, really creates disincentives for people to engage, because its easier to be in the echo chamber, Brown-Dean said. Its easier to saythe border crisis is happening far away, without thinking about the immigrant families who are right here in Middletown, who often become targeted just because of who they are, and are totally disconnected from the discourse but feel that impact.

The day was brought to a closewith a final conversation between Anand Giridharadas, who is an author and former New York Times columnist, andWesleyan President Michael Roth 78. They both stressed the importance of free inquiry and productive debate within higher education.

If we give up on the idea of persuasion, those people who dont want vaccines will never want vaccines, Giridharadas said. That kind of civic fatalism is essentially the end of American democracy.

Students who attended the event said that they valued the opportunity for current students and alumni to come together. The events alsoallowed the University to break in the newly renovated Frank Center for Public Affairs, where most of the events took place. Julia Armeli25 presented at the media literacy workshop and commented on the experience of participating in the Democracy in Action Convening.

It was fun to see so many people engaged and interested at the event, Armeli said.

Miles Craven can be reached at mcraven@wesleyan.edu.

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Democracy in Action Convening Blends Student Involvement With Academic Perspectives - Wesleyan Argus

Whats in a name? It seems in democracy as often in autocracy, having the right surname or family background means a lot, if not everything.

Prabowo Subianto, the ex-general and special forces commander, is set to become the next president of Indonesia. The man who has been implicated in some of the worst atrocities committed in his countrys recent history has successfully sold himself as a cuddly and cute grandaddy to a new generation of young voters, though not without some allegations of voter intimidation.

All eyes on Prabowo as he prepares to take charge in Indonesia

To understand his military-political career, there are two salient points: he married a daughter of the late Indonesian strongman Suharto, and he hails from a powerful banking family that holds tens of thousands of hectares of land for plantation, mining and industry.

It was ironic that for many years, he was barred from entering Australia and the United States because of allegations of human rights violations against him. These relate to the Indonesian armys role in the occupation and repression in East Timor, now Timor-Leste, and in the riots in the dying days of the Suharto regime during the Asian financial crisis, among other human rights cases.

And yet, he reportedly referred to himself as the Americans fair-haired boy. After all, he received training, as did many third world dictators and death squad leaders, in the US during the Cold War. As a young rising star in the Indonesian military, he trained at Georgias Fort Benning and North Carolinas Fort Bragg, now known as Fort Moore and Fort Liberty, respectively. And Washington tolerated, if not tacitly supported, Suhartos brutal occupation of East Timor, just as it did with the anti-communist purge which cost the lives of 400,000 to a million Indonesian civilians, many of them ethnic Chinese that was launched by Suharto as he seized power in the mid-1960s.

But thats all water under the bridge. Retiring President Joko Jokowi Widodo, who came to power thinking he would bring to justice people like Prabowo, ended up throwing his entire government apparatus to support Prabowos election bid. But that came after Jokowi and his brother-in-law, the chief justice, helped lower the age requirement in electoral law so the presidents eldest son, Gibran Rakabuming Raka, could be Prabowos running mate in the election.

The pairing mirrored the 2022 election of President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr and Vice-President Sara Duterte. Sara is a daughter of Rodrigo Duterte who is Marcos Jnrs predecessor, and Ferdinand is the son of the late Marcos Snr, one of the most brutal and corrupt dictators propped up by Washington during the Cold War. The Marcos and the Dutertes are now having a fallout, which could well destabilise Philippine politics at a pivotal moment in Southeast Asian geopolitics.

We will see how long the alliance between Prabowo and his vice-presidents family will last.

Sara Duterte for president? Philippine poll complicates row between dad and boss

Meanwhile, it looks like more political drama in Pakistan with powerful but formerly enemy clans joining hands in a marriage of convenience. The problem is that in the latest election, candidates from the party of ousted and jailed prime minister Imran Khan did surprisingly well running as independents, but not enough to secure a clean majority.

Worry not. The countrys two political dynasties, the Sharif and Bhutto clans, who respectively run the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), will form a government instead. In a power-sharing deal, Shehbaz Sharif will be prime minister while Asif Ali Zardari will be president. The latter is the father of Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, the PPP chairman.

Washington will be pleased. In pro-Imran Khan circles, many believe the Americans wanted him out. He is now serving a total of 31 years in jail from numerous corruption sentences. Thats a bit rich since he was probably no more corrupt than most of his political peers.

Last summer, The Intercept, a US online news magazine, leaked what purported to be a confidential conversation between Pakistans then ambassador to the US, Asad Majeed Khan, and Donald Lu, the US assistant secretary of state for the bureau of South and Central Asian affairs.

Lu reportedly said: I think if a no-confidence vote against the prime minister [Khan] succeeds, all will be forgiven in Washington because the Russia visit is being looked at as a decision by the prime minister. Otherwise, I think it will be tough going ahead.

Imran Khan visited Moscow on February 24, 2022, just as Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, and Washington was furious.

A month after the alleged Asad Majeed Khan-Lu meeting, the parliament in Islamabad passed a no-confidence vote to remove Imran Khan from power. After that, an avalanche of corruption charges were laid against him.

Pakistans election results a wake-up call for its military

In neighbouring Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasina has won a fifth term as prime minister. No surprise there, as her authoritarianism and political crackdowns led the opposition to boycott the election last month, so her victory was a foregone conclusion.

How did she get into politics? Well, she was a daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founding father and first president of the country. She is now the worlds longest-serving female head of state, thanks partly to her autocratic style taken after her father. Her sister is a leader of her ruling Awami League.

But she also deserved much credit for allowing close to a million Rohingya refugees fleeing genocide in Myanmar to enter her country in 2017. Perhaps given the nature of politics in her country and the region, you cant make an omelette without breaking some eggs.

US President Joe Biden likes to think that todays global struggle is between democracy and authoritarianism. But thats too simple as to falsify the nature of politics itself. Some authoritarian states can be quite responsive and responsible to their citizens needs while some democratic governments would just ignore them. Perhaps every democracy struggles with its innate authoritarian tendencies at some time or another throughout its history and will do so in the future.

And nowhere is it more difficult to resist authoritarianism in a democracy than when powerful clans or political dynasties dominate their countries. That to me is one of the most important lessons to be taken from quite a few elections these days.

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The revenge of (rich and powerful) families of democracy - South China Morning Post