Extract from ABC News
This will be the biggest year of voting in global history.
Countries with a combined population of more than three and a half billion people will head to the polls in 2024 to participate in presidential, legislative and parliamentary elections. Global population is currently a tick over 8 billion.
More than 70 countries are due to vote (a few have already), according to the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES).
Some of the largest nations in terms of population – including India, Indonesia and the United States — will take part in complex contests that will be widely watched around the world.
But smaller votes will be just as important to observe, particularly in countries where the outcome of an election could have geopolitical significance.
In Taiwan, which has a population similar in size to Australia, the elections last month helped to maintain the status quo on the island.
Millions of voters delivered a clear message to China by appointing a man Beijing had dubbed a separatist and a troublemaker.
The myriad elections still to come in 2024 could bring seismic shifts, affecting not only individual countries and their futures, but perhaps even how the world is run.
In others, casting a ballot will be a mere formality in polls that are neither free nor fair.
That's because not all political systems are equal: in some countries going to the polls this year, voters will be electing candidates or parties where the outcome is already decided due to autocratic systems.
American non-profit and democracy watchdog Freedom House assigns three categories to countries to determine their level of freedom: free, not free and partly free.
The scores are based on the real-world rights and freedoms enjoyed by individuals, rather than governments.
What these labels show is that citizens will head to the polls under disparate political systems, with varying degrees of voter rights.
With so many people casting their ballots, Nobel laureate Maria Ressa — founder and chief executive of Rappler, an investigative news site in the Philippines — sent a chilling message about the political stakes of 2024.
She warned that citizens are "electing illiberal leaders democratically", which poses a significant threat to the future of our political systems.
"We will know whether democracy lives or dies by the end of 2024," she told the National Press Club in Washington DC.
From Mexico to India, the United States to Indonesia and dozens more, this is how the year of elections could shape the future of democracy.
The 'authoritarian playbook' and threats to democracy
The world's fledgling democracies and even its more established ones are hosting elections at a turbulent moment in human history.
There are growing concerns over economic stability and inequality following a once-in-100-year pandemic.
Global tensions are heightened following the outbreak of two wars in two years.
Meanwhile, floods, droughts and famines are occurring at an unprecedented rate, spurred on by climate change.
"The coalescing of all of these elections amidst an environment of public crisis does make it a really dangerous time," said Emma Shortis, senior researcher in the international and security affairs program at the Australia Institute.
"Not just [for] democracy, but the people who live in places [holding elections] because the consequences are really deeply serious."
Of course, the timing of all these elections is coincidental. There was no master plan to put democracy to the test right now.
The system itself has faced many, many tests throughout its history.
But this big year of elections happens to coincide with what many fear has been a backslide of democratic principles around the world and a growing trend towards autocracy.
According to Swedish research institute Variety for Democracy (V-Dem), democracy has been steadily increasing around the world since the 1900s.
But in recent years that trend has stalled and democracy has started to decline.
V-Dem found a quarter of the world's population moved from living in a democracy to an autocracy in the span of 10 years.
The trend is "very serious", said Tony Banbury, president of the International Foundation for Electoral Systems.
"We see in country after country someone gaining power through the ballot box, through a democratic process, and then once in power, they start to dismantle the democratic institutions of their country," he said.
He said most leaders tend to follow an "authoritarian playbook" by going after the systems that help promote free and fair elections.
That includes election management bodies, the judiciary, and the free press.
"They change laws, change the constitution, and make the country less and less democratic via democratic means, and that is very worrying," he said.
Ahead of elections, voters are also increasingly being targeted with disinformation and misinformation campaigns from both domestic and foreign sources.
Analysts say the emergence of sophisticated tools including generative artificial intelligence — which can create text, photos and other media — has the potential to increase the scale and success of these projects.
"It's only going to get worse because of AI and … the ability of AI to greatly strengthen these efforts … including by micro-targeting and refining messages," Mr Banbury said.
The costs of these misinformation campaigns are going down, enabling bad actors to reap a huge return on investment.
"For a small amount of money — a few million dollars, for instance — a candidate and their cronies can have this extremely impactful misinformation campaign that can make the difference between them winning and losing an election," he said.
Vox's Bryan Walsh described this as the democracy paradox. While more people than ever before are set to exercise what is a fundamental right of democracy, the system itself feels remarkably fragile.
But alongside the obvious threats, analysts see opportunities for voters to show up and send a clear message at the ballot.
"It can really go either way. And that's why the voice of the electorate is so very important," Mr Banbury said.
He points to countries where there has been a reverse in democratic decline and a deepening of democracy following an election as an indication of just how crucial these contests can be.
Not everyone will be voting in free elections
More than 40 per cent of the world's electorate has the opportunity to go to the polls this year, according to IEFS.
But that doesn't mean all voters will actually take part in the democratic process.
Unlike in Australia, which has compulsory voting, many nation states allow citizens to choose whether to vote.
"In the United States, we always have a challenge in trying to promote a high voter turnout," Mr Banbury said.
Participation in an election can depend on how the electorate feels about the election process and the candidates they are voting for.
It's natural to focus on voting day, but often voter turnout can be heavily influenced by decisions made years or months before a vote.
Changes to how election commissions are run or the power of judiciary bodies can erode confidence in the political system.
So too can a climate of fear and uncertainty in the lead up to a vote.
The first country to head to the polls in 2024 was Bangladesh on January 7, with Prime Minister Sheikh's Awami League Party securing another five years in government in a controversial election marked by claims of violence and a lack of fairness.
Ahead of the election, there were months of brutality, including at least 18 arson attacks just days before the vote.
The opposition party's decision to boycott the election because of claims the government couldn't ensure a fair vote also ensured the result was already known ahead of election day.
"This is a one-sided election, you can't clap with one hand," one man told the ABC before the poll.
Critics saw the result as a clear sign the country is headed towards one-party rule.
Similar electoral shows are expected to play out in some of the least democratic countries hosting elections this year.
In Russia, voters are set to elect the country's next president in March.
But there is little doubt that leader Vladimir Putin will secure a fifth term in power, with his main rival, Alexei Navalny, serving time in a remote Arctic penal colony and all forms of dissent firmly stamped out.
The election gives Putin the veneer of democracy in what is effectively an autocratic regime.
Elections that take place in "free" or "partly free" countries will have a greater impact in terms of shifting the direction of their country.
Analysts will be watching the outcome of the Mexican election closely, with the vote set to involve a full congress reshuffle and nine state elections.
In June, voters there will choose between two women as the next president, the ruling party candidate Claudia Sheinbaum and main opposition hopeful Xochitl Galvez.
But there are looming questions over the country's commitment toward independent institutions after the government passed a bill last year to curb the power of the National Electoral Institute (INE), the non-partisan and independent agency that oversees elections.
Millions of people in Pakistan headed to the polls overnight to vote in a new government.
Ahead of the vote, the country's Human Rights commission had voiced concerns over "blatant manipulation" of the electoral process and claimed a crackdown on dissent had impeded people's ability to express their opinions.
Pakistan's neighbour, India, will go to the polls in April and May.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi appears to be confident he'll secure another term in office after his party, the BJP, won three major state elections in December.
Analysts will be following the fallout of elections there carefully.
Freedom House categorises India as partly free, explaining that while India is a multiparty democracy, the government led by Mr Modi and the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has "presided over discriminatory policies and a rise in persecution affecting the Muslim population".
"The BJP has increasingly used government institutions to target political opponents. Muslims, scheduled castes (Dalits), and scheduled tribes (Adivasis) remain economically and socially marginalised," it wrote.
Mr Modi has previously denied that discrimination against minorities existed under his government, telling reporters last year "there is no space for any discrimination [in my government]".
India will have the biggest population of people voting this year, with almost one billion people registered to vote.
But a system of rolling voting will see people cast their ballots in different parts of the country over the course of a month.
Other countries will hold votes in just one day.
The world's biggest single-day vote
On February 14, Indonesia will go to the polls to select a new president, with current leader Joko Widodo unable to run after serving his term limit.
With almost 205 million registered voters, Indonesia will see the largest single day of voting this year.
"[Indonesia] has been a real bright spot for democracy in the South East Asia region over the course of the last decade or so," Mr Banbury said.
Freedom House categories Indonesia as "partly free", acknowledging that while it has made democratic gains, "significant challenges persist".
The organisation points to "systemic corruption, discrimination and violence against minority groups, conflict in Papua, and the politicised use of defamation and blasphemy laws".
This year's votes may give us the clearest sign yet of the nation's trajectory.
"The election that will take place on February 14 will be very important for charting the the future course of that incredibly important country," Mr Banbury said.
In the city of Solo in Central Java, where the current outgoing president made his political debut, Cinta Salsabila is part of a surge of first-time voters under 30.
Despite so many people heading to the poll, Ms Salsabila isn't expecting too many delays.
"There is more than one voting booth in each village, so the queue shouldn't be too long, maybe half an hour," she said.
Behind the scenes, those observing the election build-up say it has been a "massive effort".
That's because Indonesians won't just be casting their vote on the nation's next president — they will also select the national parliament and municipal assemblies in cities across the country.
"The number of voters is huge," said Khoirunnisa Nur Agustyati, from the Association for Elections and Democracy, an NGO that carries out research and advocacy.
"There are so many types of different ballot papers that need to be prepared, and being an archipelago country, some areas are accessible by land but others can only be accessed by sea or air."
Ms Agustyati said preparations for the one-day election have been going for the past two years, and 800,000 polling booths will be set up across the country.
People will be restricted to voting at certain booths linked to their registration address and each station will have printed documents with lists of registered voters.
To guarantee election integrity, voters are required to dip their fingers in ink to ensure they can't turn up again and try to vote twice.
"Once your finger is dipped in that ink, you can't clean it off. Even once you go home and try to scrub it, the ink lasts a long time," Ms Agustyati said.
Outside the voting process itself, there are signs Indonesia's democracy is sliding backwards from a high point last decade.
Despite a minimum-age requirement of 40 to run for the top two jobs, the current president's 36-year-old son was granted a loophole to enter the vice-presidency race.
The chief justice of the constitutional court that allowed the loophole is the president's brother-in-law — though he's since been demoted after an ethics investigation.
And the frontrunner to win, Prabowo Subianto, has shown a dubious commitment democracy, twice challenging the results of election defeats in 2014 and 2019.
Last time he lost, he refused to accept the results and some supporters violently rioted on the streets of Jakarta, leading to six deaths.
Now, opinion polls suggest the 72-year-old will easily win, possibly with an outright majority on February 14, preventing the need for a run-off election in June.
An 'inflection point in global history'
In the United States, the election battle is shaping up to be a contest between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, after the former president swept recent primaries and caucuses in the Republican presidential nomination race.
The outcome of the November vote could have significant ramifications not just for the country but the global world order.
Trump is campaigning for president while fighting charges over working to overturn the 2020 election results, which culminated in a violent attack on the Capitol on January 6.
"Trump returning to power democratically or otherwise, will have enormous historical reverberations, however it plays out," Dr Shortis said.
With so many nations going to the polls, there is little doubt that this year has the potential to change the course of history.
Some analysts like Dr Shortis say 2024 could be an "inflection point".
"President Joe Biden says that this year democracy is on the ballot. I don't think that's an exaggeration. I think that is a genuine truth," she said.
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