DEMOCRACY AND FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION: Current challenges to an essential relationship
It is well known that freedom of expression is one of the essential foundations of democracy. There is a close and interdependent relationship between the two. It is therefore no coincidence that the Inter-American Court of Human Rights has described freedom of expression as a “cornerstone” of the very existence of a democratic society.
For just over two decades, global democracy enjoyed relative stability. However, current data paint a complex and changing picture, marked by new forms of threats to democracy and, therefore, to freedom of expression.
According to the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA), its September 2026 report notes that the world has now experienced eleven consecutive years in which more countries have recorded a net decline in democratic performance than have improved. This crisis has also been reflected in the steepest decline in freedom of expression in 50 years, which has certainly been the democratic component hardest hit over the past year. In this regard, V-Dem’s “Democracy Report 2026” highlights that in 2000, globally, only 5 countries restricted freedom of expression while 52 expanded, whereas by 2025 this had been dramatically reversed, with deterioration recorded in 44 countries and improvements in just 11.
This global democratic decline has even reached states considered among the most stable, with the United States standing out in particular. This country, which was among the first to enshrine freedom of the press as a protected right in its First Amendment to the Constitution in 1791, is paradoxically, almost two and a half centuries later, one of the countries with the greatest restrictions on freedom of expression. V-Dem warns that, under the current administration, indicators for freedom of expression, freedom of the press and civil liberties have fallen to their lowest level in 60 years.
The global picture reveals a worrying decline in democracy and freedom of expression. Latin America, however, has a particular situation. According to the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) 2026 Democracy and Development Report, Latin America and the Caribbean remains the most democratic region in the developing world. Nevertheless, there are profound differences between the countries that make up the region. In this context, the democratic deterioration in El Salvador is particularly illustrative: according to Freedom House, the country is classified as “Partly Free”, amid growing concentration of power in the Executive and risks to journalists and civil society organisations.
Cases such as these raise a central question: what role are those in power playing in preserving or weakening democratic checks and balances?
In their celebrated book How Democracies Die, Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt explain that contemporary authoritarianism no longer emerges through military coups or revolutions. On the contrary, today’s democracies die through the slow and gradual weakening of essential institutions, such as the legal system and freedom of the press. In this sense, democracies are no longer interrupted by a violent rupture, but undermined from within through the use of their own democratic mechanisms. And it is precisely here that the new threats of our time emerge: threats that no longer come from outside democracy, but can arise from within it.
In El Salvador, UNDP identifies the concentration of power and the weakening of systems of checks and balances among the forms of pressure facing democracies in the region. Along the same lines, Freedom House notes that the Salvadoran Executive has concentrated control over the legislature, the judiciary and oversight institutions, while independent journalists face harassment, intimidation and threats.
In the United States, V-Dem also identifies a deterioration in various democratic components during Donald Trump’s second presidency, including constraints on executive power and freedom of expression. One example occurred on 18 September 2026, when Trump announced a ban on CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House, alleging that these media outlets spread “fake news”. The following day, journalists from those outlets were denied entry to the premises.
In both cases, the leaders came to power through electoral processes, but their governments have justified certain measures to concentrate or expand executive power as necessary to protect the population from threats and ensure its security. And, of course, current threats also affect the information sphere. While these threats are real, they can also be used to the advantage of this type of government, in a context shaped by the impact of technology, which has profoundly transformed the structure of information.
International IDEA has documented how generative artificial intelligence has already begun to be used in electoral contexts to produce misleading content, including deepfakes, manipulated audio and tools capable of generating messages targeted at specific audiences. In Latin America, its study of the 2024 elections in Brazil and Mexico shows precisely how these technologies can be used both to inform and enable participation, and to deceive and manipulate.
What happens when an image, a voice or a video can be artificially created and appear completely real? What happens when a false narrative spreads massively in a matter of seconds? And, above all, how can a democracy protect freedom of expression from the threats posed by disinformation and artificial intelligence without the State’s own regulatory response ends up stifling the very right it seeks to defend?
Combating information manipulation without allowing it to become a justification for disproportionately restricting freedom of expression is one of the new tensions facing democracies.
Unfortunately, current laws against fake news, initially conceived to protect public debate from disinformation, have also been misused in contexts of concentrated power. UNESCO identified at least 57 laws and regulations in 44 countries, adopted or amended since 2016, that contain vague provisions or disproportionate penalties, creating risks for freedom of expression and the media.
The foundations of a strong democracy depend not only on the existence of elections, but also on citizens who participate freely and effectively in public affairs, exchange ideas, question those in power, denounce abuses and, of course, have free access to reliable information.
There is no democracy without freedom of expression, and there is no democracy without citizen participation either. Its defence therefore cannot rest solely on constitutional texts, but must also rely on an active and critical citizenry. Protecting truth and institutions must also be an everyday exercise in citizen oversight.
By Pamela Alcázar, international analyst, with a background in International Relations and Administration. She is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Governance and Human Rights at the Autonomous University of Madrid. FIBGAR contributor.
References:
Inter-American Court of Human Rights (1985). Compulsory Membership in an Association Prescribed by Law for the Practice of Journalism (Arts. 13 and 29 of the American Convention on Human Rights). Advisory Opinion OC-5/85, 13 November 1985, Series A No. 5. Official text of Advisory Opinion OC-5/85
Levitsky, Steven and Daniel Ziblatt. How Democracies Die. Barcelona: Editorial Ariel, 2018.
Nord, M., Altman, D., Fernandes, T., Good God, A., & Lindberg, S. I. (2026). Democracy Report 2026: Unraveling The Democratic Era? University of Gothenburg: V-Dem Institute.
SweDev. (31 March 2026). V-Dem Democracy Report 2026. https://swedev.dev/v-dem-democracy-report-2026
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) (2026). Democracy and Development Report 2026: Democracies Under Pressure. Reimagining the Futures of Democracy and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean. UNDP.
Freedom House (2026). El Salvador: Freedom in the World 2026 Country Report. Freedom House.
International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. (2026). The Global State of Democracy 2026: Democracy in an Age of Conflict. International IDEA.
Regulation (EU) 2022/2065 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 October 2022 on a Single Market for Digital Services and amending Directive 2000/31/EC (Digital Services Act). Official Journal of the European Union, L 277, 27 October 2022, pp. 1–102.
UNESCO (2022). World Trends in Freedom of Expression and Media Development: Global Report 2021/2022. Paris: UNESCO.
