Azerbaijan | Brazil | Colombia | Egypt | Georgia | India | Kenya | Liberia | Mongolia | Nepal | Nicaragua | Nigeria | Peru | Russia | South Africa | Tanzania | Thailand | Turkey | Ukraine | Venezuela | Zimbabwe

AZERBAIJAN
 

Emin Huseynov is an Azerbaijani journalist and human rights defender, co-founder of the Institute for Reporters’ Freedom and Safety, and Director at the Institute for Human Rights. Over 20 years, he has worked to defend press freedom and document repression in Azerbaijan. In 2014, amid a government crackdown, Emin spent over 10 months hiding in the Swiss Embassy in Baku before reaching safety in Switzerland. He was then arbitrarily stripped of his citizenship. Since 2015, Emin has been actively working to raise awareness of gross human rights violations in the South Caucasus, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia on major international platforms, including the United Nations, the OSCE, and the Council of Europe.

BRAZIL
 

Pedro Telles is a Program Director at the Democracy Hub (D-Hub), dedicated to network-building, capacity-building, and strategic support for democracy defenders globally. He is also an adjunct professor at Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV) and a Senior Atlantic Fellow for Social and Economic Equity at the London School of Economics (LSE), with extensive experience working in civil society, government, philanthropy, and elections. He is a co-founder of multiple organizations focused on advocacy and civic engagement, such as Ctrl+Z, Quid, and Advocacy Hub, and is a board member of Avaaz, Transparência Brasil, and Legisla Brasil. He has also worked at Greenpeace, Luminate, and the Legislative Assembly of São Paulo.

COLOMBIA
 

Andry Gonzalez is an economist with a master’s degree in Urban Planning and a Fulbright alumna. She served as an adviser to the Office of the Vice President of Colombia, Francia Márquez, advancing racial equity and territorial development. She currently works as a Program Manager at Open Society Foundations. She believes democracy must be meaningful in everyday life and that true development requires redistributing power, not just resources. She is passionate about supporting young people and women from marginalized communities to step into spaces of influence and shape the future of their territories.

EGYPT
 

Ahmed Attalla F. Ali is an Egyptian political and human rights activist and researcher. He is a co-founder of the grassroots pro-democracy April 6 Movement, contributing to its political direction and governance after the 2011 revolution. Since 2018, he has served as Executive Director of the Egyptian Front for Human Rights, leading documentation, research, legal assistance, and international advocacy. He has published studies and articles on civil-military relations, social movements, human rights, and EU–MENA relations. He holds a Law degree and a diploma in Political Science, and is currently pursuing an MA in EU Studies at UCLouvain, Belgium.

GEORGIA
 

Tamar Rukhadze is a media and civil society professional with nearly 30 years of experience promoting independent journalism and freedom of expression in Georgia. She began her career as a reporter in 1997, later leading major newsrooms before focusing on advancing media ethics, accountability, and resilience through civil society and international initiatives. Tamar previously served as Executive Director and Board Chair of the Georgian Charter of Journalistic Ethics and has held senior positions with IREX on USAID-funded programs. In 2025, she became Deputy Director of Batumelebi & Netgazeti following the arrest of founder and CEO Mzia Amaglobeli.

INDIA
 

Dilip Kumar Pandey is a PhD scholar, a former MLA from Timarpur, and an ex-Chief Whip in the Delhi Assembly. He comes from a farming family in Ghazipur, Uttar Pradesh, and holds an MCA degree. Known for his anti-corruption work and association with UNCAC, he is also an author of 5 books, including the bestseller, Gulabi Khanjar. A recurve archer, he is a music enthusiast who has written, sung, and composed various campaign songs for the Aam Aadmi Party. He runs the Radhika Prahlad Foundation, which supports medical care for the underprivileged, and has served as a member of Delhi’s Sahitya Kala Parishad. He is also an expert in inclusive policy, governance, political communication, and co-existential philosophy.
 

Srikanta Kumar Routa serves as Head of Operations at The/Nudge Institute, where he orchestrates large-scale economic inclusion initiatives to uplift rural and tribal households from extreme poverty. With over 13 years of distinguished expertise in the development sector, he has successfully scaled the Graduation Approach to serve 200,000 families, facilitating $100 million investment through strategic government and private partnerships. An alumnus of TISS Hyderabad, Srikanta is recognized for his strategic acumen and operational excellence across India’s most remote terrains. He remains steadfast in his mission to foster universal equity and sustainable development for marginalized communities.

KENYA
 

Keith Andare is a Nairobi-based internet consultant working at the intersection of digital rights and climate action. He is the founder and executive director of the African Centre for Climate Research and Innovations (ACCRI), a pan-African civil society organization focused on environmental and digital transitions. Andare has extensive experience in digital rights and internet governance, having served as a member of the Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) for the Kenyan, East African, and African Internet Governance Forums. He is passionate about cybersecurity and digital democracy.
 

Aimee Akinyi Ongeso is a Program Manager at Open Society Africa and an Obama Africa Leader. She is a democracy and justice practitioner with more than 16 years of experience advancing legal empowerment, participatory governance, and community-led justice across Africa. Her work focuses on designing and scaling grassroots-driven models that integrate law, organizing, and economic justice to strengthen democratic systems, particularly in conflict-affected contexts.

LIBERIA
 

Lamii Kpargoi is a Commissioner of the Office of the Ombudsman of the Republic of Liberia with a professional interest in human rights advocacy. Over the last 20 years, Mr. Kpargoi has worked as a civil society activist, with 16 of those years spent practicing law in Liberia. He is known for his dedication to upholding democratic values, promoting press freedom, and advocating for human rights. As a Chevening Scholar, he earned an LLM in Labour Law and Corporate Governance from the University of Bristol in the UK in 2019-2020. Mr. Kpargoi is also a Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellow and a US State Department Community Solutions Fellow.

MONGOLIA
 

Nominchimeg Odsuren is a Mongolian politician and a current Member of Parliament, with a professional background in law and a strong focus on advancing the rule of law. Trained at the University of Tokyo and Columbia Law School, she specializes in comparative, private, and economic law. Her work promotes transparency, accountability, and effective governance. With a cross-cultural perspective, she applies global best practices to strengthen legal frameworks and support sustainable policy reform in emerging democracies.

NEPAL
 

Pratik Kunwar is a political innovator and the Founder of Shaasan, a nonprofit civic initiative solving problems at the intersection of governance, climate, and deep learning. His work has been featured by Time, Forbes, the UN, and the WEF, among others. He has advocated for his work at the European Parliament, World Forum for Democracy, Davos, and One Young World, among others. Pratik is an Asia Society Next Generation Leader (2024) and has served on the European Union's International Youth Sounding Board and on the Advisory Council of the WEF's Global Shapers Community. Pratik holds a Master's in Data, Economics, and Design of Policy from MIT.

NICARAGUA
 

Berta Valle is a Nicaraguan journalist and human rights advocate with extensive experience in media and international advocacy. Forced into exile in 2018, she became a leading voice for political prisoners following the arbitrary detention of her husband, Félix Maradiaga, in 2021. She is a co-founder of the World Liberty Congress Political Prisoner Support Team and the End Arbitrary Detention initiative at the University of Virginia, and serves as President of Fundación Libertad, advancing human rights and democratic restoration in Nicaragua. Her work also explores the use of decentralized technologies to strengthen financial freedom in repressive contexts.

NIGERIA
 

Ayodele Ganiu is a cultural policy advocate with over 16 years of leadership advancing democratic reforms in Nigeria’s culture sector. As the Founder of Unchained Vibes Africa (UVA), he combats a shrinking civic space through the "Freedom Vibes" initiative, which combines transformative art with strategic litigation. Known for translating complex governance issues into cultural narratives that defy censorship, his work has yielded landmark legal victories and policy reforms, earning UVA the 2026 Bertha Artivism Award. He holds a B.Sc. in Finance from the University of Lagos and advanced training in cultural policy from the UNESCO Chair’s Arts Rights Justice Academy at the University of Hildesheim.

PERU
 

Álvaro Henzler is a serial social entrepreneur with 20+ years of experience. He has founded ventures in education, social impact, civic engagement, and leadership development. President of Asociación Civil Transparencia, Peru’s leading democracy NGO, co-founder and Executive President of Mosaico, advancing collective impact across Latin America, and co-founder of EnseñaPerú (member of Teach For All network). He holds an MPA from Harvard Kennedy School and a BA in Economics from Universidad del Pacífico, was a Research Fellow at Harvard’s Ash Center, and an advisor during the Peru–U.S. FTA. He was named a WEF Global Shaper and Georgetown Impact Award recipient.

RUSSIA
 

Leonid Drabkin is a senior executive with extensive experience leading OVD-Info, one of Russia’s largest and most respected human rights organizations, where he focused on documenting political prosecutions and providing legal support. He brings eight years of NGO leadership experience, complemented by work in media development and the pharmaceutical sector across Russia and in international settings. Drabkin holds an MSc in Finance from the United Kingdom and is recognized for a results-driven, change-oriented approach to advancing human rights. He was named to Forbes 30 Under 30 and is currently working in exile following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

SOUTH AFRICA
 

Tania Coenraad is a governance, democracy, and development practitioner based in Cape Town. Most recently she served as the Chief of Staff and Head of Parliamentary Operations, providing strategic leadership on legislative affairs, parliamentary oversight, and stakeholder engagement in South Africa. With over 17 years of experience across Parliament, local government, and community development, she has advanced socio-economic inclusion and strengthened institutional accountability. Her work is driven by a commitment to ethical leadership, constitutional democracy, and development outcomes.

TANZANIA
 

Deus Valentine Rweyemamu is the founding CEO of the Center for Strategic Litigation (CSL), an East African think-and-do tank focused on addressing a regional rule of law crisis. He is a reputed advisor on human rights, governance, and advocacy for various international organizations. Previously, Deus worked at the Open Society Foundations' Eastern Africa office, building the Tanzania portfolio. He helped establish key human rights and constitutional organizations like the Tanzania Human Rights Defenders Coalition and the Tanzania Constitutional Forum. He helped found CEMOT, a technology-powered election observation coalition based on the Election Situation Room model.

THAILAND
 

Bencha Saengchantra is a former Member of the House of Representatives and currently serves on the Education and Training Committee. Over eight years in parliament, she supported and advanced legislation promoting democratic reform, human rights, gender equality, and social justice. Her work has focused on strengthening rule of law, expanding civic participation, and improving quality of life. As a participant in the Fisher Family Summer Fellows Program, she seeks to deepen her understanding of democratic governance and collaborate with global leaders to advance legal reform, equality, and democratic resilience in Thailand, across Asia, and around the world.
 

Dr. Janjira Sombatpoonsiri is an activist scholar whose work examines how authoritarian power adapts in the digital age and how civic actors respond. She is a Research Fellow at the German Institute for Global and Area Studies (GIGA) in Hamburg and a full-time Assistant Professor at Chulalongkorn University’s Institute of Asian Studies in Bangkok. Her research spans protest movements, democratic resilience, and digital repression. Her forthcoming book is A Thousand Cuts: Digital Repression and Democracy in Thailand (2027, University of Wisconsin Press). She hopes to develop a regional policy hub that fosters cross-learning and collaboration across Southeast Asia.

TURKEY
 

Zeynep Aksoy is a senior strategist based in Istanbul. At House of Impact, she works at the intersection of data, technology, and social research, translating behavioral insight into high-impact strategies for institutions and public actors. Her work spans large-scale national and local public initiatives. She holds a BA in Middle Eastern History and Politics and an MA in Political Theory from Sciences Po Paris. With a background in editorial and on-screen media, she continues to work across long-form and digital formats. She serves on the boards of SES Equality and Solidarity Association.

UKRAINE*
 

Kateryna Chernohorenko is the architect of digital transformation and a former Deputy Minister of Defense of Ukraine (2023–2025). During her tenure, she launched Reserve+ and Army+ mobile apps, digitizing millions of military records and dozens of services. She scaled DELTA, the NATO-certified combat system, and led the Drone and IT Coalition, mobilizing $3.3B+ in aid. Kateryna also established Ukraine's Cyber Incident Response Center and founded the Space Policy Directorate in the MoD of Ukraine. She leads the digital transformation program at the High Qualification Commission of Judges and teaches “E-Governance, Document Management, and Digital Democracy” at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy.
 

Illia Filipov* is a Ukrainian edtech entrepreneur and co-founder & CEO of EdEra. With a physics background from Taras Shevchenko National University, he chose to build educational infrastructure in Ukraine rather than pursue opportunities abroad. Since 2014, he has led the development of 300+ educational products, reaching over 2 million users on EdEra’s platform and millions more through solutions for government and business. He has worked with national institutions and international partners on education reforms, media literacy, and civic engagement, and served as an advisor to government bodies and the OSCE. His work focuses on expanding access to education to strengthen democratic systems.
 

Svitlana Kovalchuk* is Executive Director of Yalta European Strategy (YES), Ukraine’s leading platform advancing European integration and global dialogue on democracy, security, and development. For nearly a decade, she has led YES and the Victor Pinchuk Foundation's international initiatives, strengthening Ukraine’s global presence through the YES Annual Meeting in Kyiv and platforms at the World Economic Forum and the Munich Security Conference. She previously worked at the German Corporation for International Cooperation. Svitlana holds a PhD in Political Science and is an alumna of Harvard Kennedy School.
 

Valentyna Riznyk* is a Ukrainian public affairs professional and legal scholar with experience in local governance and national policymaking. She serves as Secretary of the Poltava Regional Organization of the political party “Servant of the People” and is a member of the Youth Council under the Ministry of Economy of Ukraine. Valentyna has worked as an assistant to Members of Parliament and as an advisor to political leadership, contributing to legislative processes and community engagement. She holds a PhD in Law and a Master’s degree in Political Science, with a focus on strengthening democratic institutions and public trust in governance systems.
 

*These fellows are jointly participating in CDDRL’s Strengthening Ukrainian Democracy and Development Program.

VENEZUELA
 

Pedro A. Urruchurtu Noselli is a political scientist and activist who serves as Senior Advisor on Foreign Affairs and Director of International Relations for María Corina Machado, as well as International Coordinator for Vente Venezuela. As a key strategist, he has helped mobilize international support for democracy in Venezuela, focusing on building global networks to counter authoritarianism. His work is defined by a commitment to diplomacy and political education, having trained more than 45,000 individuals. He is an alumnus of Georgetown University’s Global Competitiveness Leadership Program and was recently honored with the 2026 Impact Award for his courage. Pedro has faced political persecution for his work, including spending more than 400 days as a hostage in the Argentine Embassy in Caracas before his escape.

ZIMBABWE
 

Gladys Kudzaishe Hlatywayo is a Member of Parliament for Harare Province in Zimbabwe. She is a democracy/human rights activist and a feminist with over 20 years of experience. She has been active in both Zimbabwean civil society and opposition movements as a change agent, advocating for a democratic Zimbabwe. She was a 2014-2015 Hubert H. Humphrey Fellow at the University of Minnesota (United States)  and a 2016/2017 Chevening Scholar at the London School of Economics and Political Science (United Kingdom). She holds an MSc in Public Management and Governance from LSE, an MSc in Development Studies from the National University of Science and Technology, and a BA Degree from the University of Zimbabwe.

At the institute level, the partnership also reinforces Stanford’s broader role in advancing research and engagement on democracy.

“As the threats to democratic governance around the world multiply, so too must our commitment to the rigorous, interdisciplinary scholarship that seeks to understand and address them,” said Colin Kahl, director of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. “Bringing the esteemed Journal of Democracy to CDDRL creates a powerful nexus for this vital work, strengthening FSI's role as a global leader in the study of democracy."

At the same time, the partnership comes at a moment of heightened global pressure on democratic institutions, underscoring the importance of the Journal’s role in the field.

“We are now in the twentieth consecutive year of global democratic decline — no longer just a ‘democratic recession,’ but a broader wave of authoritarian reversals,” said Larry Diamond. “Yet the struggle for democracy continues. Now more than ever, we need to understand both the causes of democratic decay and the conditions for recovery and renewal. The Journal of Democracy is unique in combining rigorous scholarship with timely, accessible analysis of developments around the world.”

For Stanford students, the partnership creates a more direct pathway into the world of ideas, publishing, and public scholarship. Through new editorial internships, undergraduates and recent graduate alumni can gain hands-on experience working with a leading journal that bridges scholarship and practice.

It also strengthens Stanford’s intellectual presence in democracy studies by giving CDDRL-affiliated faculty a more formal role in supporting the Journal’s work through serving on its editorial board. Stanford faculty will contribute to the Journal’s editorial mission, inspire new lines of inquiry, and help to identify emerging areas of research to be explored in its pages.

“This partnership with CDDRL is exceptionally exciting for the Journal of Democracy and its readers,” shared Will Dobson, the Journal’s co-editor. “CDDRL is not only the leading research center in the field, but its long history of collaboration with the Journal makes this a natural fit. We are thrilled to be working with CDDRL and with the possibilities this partnership will unlock.”

With a wide readership and growing digital footprint, the Journal of Democracy reaches audiences across academia, government, journalism, and civil society. It publishes roughly 100 online-exclusive essays each year alongside its quarterly print issues and engages readers through newsletters with more than 20,000 subscribers, across social media, in Apple News, and on leading podcasts. As the most-read journal in the Johns Hopkins University Press portfolio of more than 750 publications, it has become a central venue for ideas about democratic governance and political change worldwide. Through its partnership with CDDRL, the Journal is positioned to expand that reach even further — drawing on Stanford’s research community and global practitioner networks to bring new voices and perspectives into the conversation.

The "Meet Our Researchers" series showcases the incredible scholars at Stanford’s Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL). Through engaging interviews conducted by our undergraduate research assistants, we explore the journeys, passions, and insights of CDDRL’s faculty and researchers.

How should we understand the role of fragmentation versus centralization in state formation?

Prof. Blaydes argued that fragmentation plays a foundational role in the development of strong institutions. Specifically, fragmentation and decentralization reduce the power of centralized rulers, fostering a political culture of executive constraint. This culture is critical for the later emergence of durable institutions, including democracy.

However, Prof. Blaydes clarified that fragmentation alone is not sufficient. Strong states are still necessary for effective governance and capacity. The key lies in sequencing: societies benefit from an initial phase of fragmentation that establishes executive constraint, followed by the development of centralized state capacity. In Prof. Blaydes’s view, both elements are necessary, but fragmentation must come first to produce stable and accountable institutions.

How can political culture arguments avoid becoming essentialist?

Prof. Blaydes defined political culture not as something rooted in geography or religion, but as a set of incentive structures that enable elites to constrain rulers. In this framework, political culture emerges from institutional conditions rather than inherent societal traits.

Prof. Blaydes emphasized that such cultures can arise in diverse contexts, provided that power differentials between rulers and elites are sufficiently reduced. However, in historically entrenched centralized states, this process is more difficult because rulers tend to remain far above other elites, limiting opportunities for constraint.

Is geography deterministic in shaping political outcomes?

Prof. Blaydes rejected deterministic interpretations of geography. Instead, geography was described as having probabilistic effects — it increases the likelihood of certain political outcomes without making them inevitable. Terrain and resource distribution can shape whether states tend toward centralization or fragmentation, but institutional and historical contingencies remain critical.

Is there a trade-off between state capacity and institutional durability?

Prof. Blaydes suggested that the relationship is not necessarily a direct trade-off but can be understood in terms of differences in political structures and ruler–elite dynamics. Systems with strong central authority may achieve high capacity but lack mechanisms for constraint, whereas more decentralized systems may develop more durable institutions over time.

Why would rulers adopt systems of alien rule (e.g., Mamluks)?

Prof. Blaydes explained that rulers often adopt such strategies to secure loyalty. Foreign elites are less tied to local populations and therefore more dependent on the ruler, making them appear more reliable.

However, Prof. Blaydes noted that this creates long-term instability. While individual rulers may perceive these arrangements as beneficial, over time, such elites can coordinate and overthrow rulers. Individual rulers may not recognize this pattern due to short time horizons and limited information, meaning the instability only becomes visible in aggregate historical data.

Does leadership quality decline over time within dynasties?

Prof. Blaydes argued that leadership quality often declines across generations within dynasties. Founders tend to possess exceptional capabilities, but these traits are not consistently transmitted to successors. Drawing on Ibn Khaldun, Prof. Blaydes noted that ruling groups often lose their initial cohesion and strength over time, becoming vulnerable to replacement by new elites.

Prof. Blaydes also suggested that assimilation into society may contribute to this decline by enabling coordination among subjects against rulers.

Do religious institutions independently shape political outcomes?

Prof. Blaydes took an endogenous view, arguing that religion does not independently determine political outcomes. Instead, religious institutions reflect broader social and political dynamics. Religious elites may either constrain or reinforce the state depending on their relationship with political authority, particularly whether they possess independent sources of power or revenue.

Overview and Contribution:

The rule of law (RoL) is an important component of democracy, key to protecting individual rights and ensuring that representatives follow the same rules as those being represented. As countries become more democratic, one would expect corresponding increases in the rule of law.

In “Fabricated Justice,” Beatriz Magaloni and Esteban Salmón show how these expectations must be seriously qualified. Beginning in 2008, Mexico gradually implemented RoL reforms. Thereafter, citizens witnessed some important gains in due process and individual rights, in particular, a dramatic decline in torture. However, these changes coincided with rising insecurity, violence, and popular demands for retribution against criminals. Owing to these pressures — as well as their own desire to work with fewer constraints — police and prosecutors found ways to circumvent the new reforms, particularly by planting evidence (drugs and weapons) on suspects, a serious RoL violation. 

However laudable its reforms, Mexican authorities failed to equip justice system officials with the tools and capacities to properly fight crime. Facing similar social and professional pressures as they had prior to the reforms, fabricated evidence struck them as a reasonable adaptation to new procedures. 

Marshalling an impressive array of quantitative and qualitative data, Magaloni and Salmón show how these legal changes can be said to have led to changes in police tactics and in the categories of arrests made. Interviews with police and prosecutors make clear just how much RoL reforms have left justice system officials feeling impotent and compelled to “fabricate justice.”

Mexico’s (Staggered) Legal Changes:

Prior to 2008, Mexico’s legal system was an “inquisitorial” one inherited from Spanish colonial rule. This meant that judges largely based their rulings on an often-secretive case file assembled by police and prosecutors. Case files contained confessions frequently obtained by torture, which Mexico’s Supreme Court upheld on multiple occasions. After 2008, however, Mexico adopted an “adversarial” system with greater procedural oversight of detention and the early stages of investigation (when torture was more likely), stricter standards on the use of force and collection of evidence, and so on.

Importantly, Mexico’s RoL constitutional amendment set an 8-year period to fully implement the reforms. This led to a high degree of variation in when individual states adopted the reforms, as well as whether they adopted all of the reforms at once or in a piecemeal fashion. From a statistical point of view, this created a “quasi-experimental” scenario in which outcomes (e.g., whether prisoners reported being tortured) in “treated” states or municipalities (i.e., those that reformed) could be compared with “control” units that had not yet reformed. This helps ensure that other differences between states and municipalities (e.g., levels of economic development or state capacity) do not bias the results.

Quantitative and Qualitative Findings:

Magaloni and Salmón first draw on a 2021 survey of 60,000 prisoners conducted by Mexico’s National Institute of Statistics and Geography. The authors document (1) a substantial decline in reports of torture after 2014 (when many states and municipalities implemented the RoL reforms), (2) a rise in drug and weapons convictions by 2016 (likely the product of evidence fabrication), and (3) a decline in homicide convictions (because [a] homicide confessions could no longer be elicited through torture and [b] corpses are difficult to fabricate). These findings are largely borne out when the authors conduct their “difference in differences” analysis using the aforementioned geographical and temporal variation. As the authors show, declines in torture are likely driven by greater judicial oversight of cases, a key goal of the 2008 reforms.
 

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Fig. 1. Torture and objects (drugs and weapons).

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Fig. 4. Event study plots with imputation estimator: torture, objects, judicial oversight, and drug trafficking.
 

To show that these quantitative findings have some basis in the beliefs of criminal justice actors, the authors conducted extensive fieldwork across Mexico. This included interviewing over 100 police officers and prosecutors, observing the activities of investigative agencies for 18 months, and following dozens of cases from arrest to hearing. This generated some remarkably honest reflections about how arrests are systematically based on false accusations and the planting of evidence on suspects. 

Interviews with police reveal a widespread belief that the RoL reforms profoundly disrupted their work. To be sure, some of these “disruptions” simply concern how police can no longer torture suspects. For example, “With arrests, we used to investigate, we could pressure them, get information. Now we are just transporters. We catch them and deliver them. That’s all” (p.10, italics added). 

Another important aspect of these changes concerns just how much time it takes to complete arrest paperwork to meet new legal requirements. This highlights officers’ limited capacity to perform since the reforms were implemented. Many reported simply not making arrests, while others bluntly admitted:

Before, we pressured the person. Now we pressure the paperwork…chain of custody has to be perfect. If it’s not, the judge will throw it out. So…[w]e fix it. Sometimes that means planting what’s missing, sometimes writing what didn’t happen (p.10). 

Meanwhile, some prosecutors expressed nostalgia for the days when their authority was less constrained and, for example, they could raid homes without warrants. Prosecutors spoke openly about the strains on police capacity and the corresponding need for fabricated evidence: “If the police officers really investigated properly, they could get the criminals for what they actually did. They’ve just been instructed to take them out of circulation no matter what” (p.12). 

Finally, the authors show that evidence fabrication is consistent with the strong desire for retribution held by ordinary Mexicans. There is a widespread perception that the new criminal justice system is too lenient, a source of impunity for criminals. Accordingly, cases that prosecutors deem especially likely to anger the public are classified as “relevant,” compelling prosecutors to resolve them at all costs, especially by encouraging officers to plant evidence. Prosecutors who don’t accept these cases may be demoted or fired. In sum, Magaloni and Salmón deepen our understanding of just how difficult it is to democratize in places where criminal justice systems are poorly resourced and where citizens demand a specific kind of retributive justice that often sidesteps individual rights.

*Brief prepared by Adam Fefer.
 

2. U.S. Security Partnerships Can Make Arab States Targets

Yom highlighted a paradox shaping the strategic environment of Arab states: the closer their security ties with the United States, the more vulnerable they may become in a regional confrontation.

“For the most part,” Yom explained, “the intensity of Iranian counterstrikes and retaliation on Arab states covaries with the degree of their relationship with the United States.”

States hosting American military bases or deeply integrated into U.S. security strategy are more likely to find themselves on the frontlines of Iranian retaliation.

“The more of a client state they are, the more troops they host, the deeper their foreign policies are tied to the demands of American grand strategy — then the more likely they are going to be struck.”

This dynamic creates a fundamental strategic dilemma.

For decades, small and medium-sized states in the region have relied on alliances with Washington to enhance their security. The current conflict illustrates how those same alliances can also increase their exposure to regional escalation.

3. Arab Governments Are Trying to Avoid Being Seen as Participants in the War

Arab governments today face a difficult balancing act: responding to Iranian attacks while avoiding the perception that they are fighting alongside the United States and Israel. Many Arab governments must navigate public opinion that is deeply skeptical of Israel and wary of Western military intervention in the region.

As Sallam put it, these governments are trying to avoid creating “the impression that they are fighting alongside the United States and Israel in this war.”

The result is a diplomatic tightrope: condemning attacks on their territory without being drawn into the broader conflict.

4. A Regional War Threatens the Gulf’s Economic Transformation Projects

A fourth major takeaway concerns the economic stakes of regional stability.

Blaydes emphasized that wars can have far-reaching political economy consequences. Major conflicts reshape investment patterns, redirect state resources toward security priorities, and increase global perceptions of risk.

When governments must divert resources toward defense spending and crisis management, economic diversification plans can quickly lose momentum.

For Gulf regimes that have tied their political projects to visions of economic modernization, prolonged regional instability therefore represents a serious political challenge.

“Suddenly, when you have a conflict that disrupts the flow of investments, tourism, and even trading routes in places like the Strait of Hormuz or the Red Sea,” Sallam observed, “this shakes the foundations of these projects.”

5. The War Is Occurring Amid Deep Divisions Among Regional Powers

The discussion highlighted that the war with Iran is unfolding against the backdrop of a significant regional rift.

According to Sallam, one emerging divide involves different visions for managing instability in fragile states. Some regional actors — including the UAE and Israel — have tacitly or directly promoted fragmentation of political authority in places like Sudan, Yemen, and Gaza.

Others, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Turkey, have tended to favor more traditional models of centralized authoritarian stability.

These competing strategic preferences have already clashed in multiple regional conflicts, most recently in Sudan and Yemen.

Thus, Iran’s potential neutralization as a regional power player as a result of the war, Sallam noted, will not necessarily result in regional stability. It will simply intensify these rivalries among the remaining powers.

6. War Strengthens Authoritarian Politics and Weakens the Prospect for Reform and Development

The panel highlighted the negative ramifications of regional conflict for reform and development.

“The constant violence is not productive for the promotion of democracy, development, or the rule of law,” Blaydes noted. “Having a constant stream of weapons, conflict, violence, post-conflict reconciliation, [and] regional rivalries…undermines all three.”

“Anytime a regional conflict breaks out,” Yom argued, “it’s always bad for democratic struggle on the home front.”

The war, according to Sallam, could result in outcomes that would be “catastrophic not only for the people and society of Iran, but also the people and societies of the region at large.”

A full recording of the March 3 panel can be viewed below: