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Shannon Johnson earned a masters from Stanford's Liberal Arts program, with a thesis entitled "'We were all White once': Race, Polygamy, and the Salvific Mormon Family." Her BA from Brigham Young University is in English literature; she wrote an honors thesis there on "Emily Dickinson: Transcendental Trinitarian." She worked in admin at Columbia University and as an English teacher in Japan and Egypt before taking time away to raise four children. Shannon has been at The Europe Center since 2014, and joined the staff at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law in 2020.
This book evaluates the global status and prospects of democracy, with an emphasis on the quality of democratic institutions and the effectiveness of governance as key conditions for stable democracy. Bringing together a wide range of the author’s work over the past three decades, it advances a framework for assessing the quality of democracy and it analyzes alternative measures of democracy. Drawing on the most recent data from Freedom House, it assesses the global state of democracy and freedom, as of the beginning of 2015, and it explains why the world has been experiencing a mild but now deepening recession of democracy and freedom since 2005.
A major theme of the book across the three decades of the author’s work is the relationship between democratic quality and stability. Democracies break down, Diamond argues, not so much because of economic factors but because of corrupt, inept governance that violates individual rights and the rule of law. The best way to secure democracy is to ensure that democracy is accountable, transparent, genuinely competitive, respectful of individual rights, inclusive of diverse forms and sources of participation, and responsive to the needs and aspirations of ordinary citizens. Viable democracy requires not only a state that can mobilize power to achieve collective goals, but also one that can restrain and punish the abuse of power—a particularly steep challenge for poor countries and those with natural resource wealth.
The book examines these themes both in broad comparative perspective and with a deeper analysis of historical trends and future prospects in Africa and Asia,. Concluding with lessons for sustaining and reforming policies to promote democracy internationally, this book is essential reading for students and scholars interested in democracy, as well as politics and international relations more generally.
In a recent piece in Stanford News, FSI Senior Fellow Larry Diamond expresses his thoughts on the ebbing of global democratic expansion, highlighting that not all countries have equal opportunities at achieving democracy and that democratic change should be approached multilaterally.
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Larry Diamond speaks on his new book "In Search of Democracy," at the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) in Washington, D.C. | National Endowment for Democracy
New President of the United States Institute of Peace, Nancy Lindborg, will discuss the global challenge of fragility and conflict, including a vision of the way forward. Ms. Lindborg’s remarks reflect a lifetime of working in the world’s most fragile regions and a time when the global humanitarian system is at a breaking point, with record numbers of people forcibly displaced globally.
Speaker Bio
Nancy Lindborg
Nancy Lindborg has served since February, 2015, as President of the United States Institute of Peace, an independent institution founded by Congress to provide practical solutions for preventing and resolving violent conflict around the world.
Ms. Lindborg has spent most of her career working in fragile and conflict affected regions around the world. Prior to joining USIP, she served as the Assistant Administrator for the Bureau for Democracy, Conflict and Humanitarian Assistance (DCHA) at USAID. From 2010 through early 2015, Ms. Lindborg led USAID teams focused on building resilience and democracy, managing and mitigating conflict and providing urgent humanitarian assistance. Ms. Lindborg led DCHA teams in response to the ongoing Syria Crisis, the droughts in Sahel and Horn of Africa, the Arab Spring, the Ebola response and numerous other global crises.
Prior to joining USAID, Ms. Lindborg was president of Mercy Corps, where she spent 14 years helping to grow the organization into a globally respected organization known for innovative programs in the most challenging environments. She started her international career working overseas in Kazakhstan and Nepal.
Ms. Lindborg has held a number of leadership and board positions including serving as co-president of the Board of Directors for the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition; co-founder and board member of the National Committee on North Korea; and chair of the Sphere Management Committee. She is a member of Council on Foreign Relations.
She holds a B.A and M.A. in English Literature from Stanford University and an M.A. in Public Administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
Nancy Lindborg
President of the United States Institute of Peace
President of the United States Institute of Peace
Nancy Lindborg
