9781422277706

select their government. There are no gender, racial, or ethnic limits in defining citizenship. In elections, the government allows universal suffrage—all adult citizens have the right to vote. Citizens of a liberal democracy can also have faith that the government will protect their fundamental rights. Such rights include the right to free speech, the right to choose one’s reli- gion, and the right to fair legal proceedings if accused of a crime. Property rights are protected and people have the right to consent to policies that affect them. At the turn of the 20th century, most of the world’s govern- ments were monarchies. Today, most countries are democra- cies, according to Freedom House, a U.S. government–funded organization based in Washington, D.C., that evaluates govern- ments’ defense of political rights and civil liberties in countries around the world. In its 2018 “Freedom in the World” report, Freedom House found that 63 percent of countries (123 out of 195) were electoral democracies. This means citizens have the right to vote for their government in elections, and that the governments generally respect and protect the rights of citi- zens. By comparison, in 1990—the earliest year that Freedom House tracked the number of electoral democracies—only 41 percent of countries qualified for this classification. And yet, there are troubling problems. Since 2006, Freedom House has found that the basic tenets of democracy—such as guarantees of free and fair elections, the rights of minorities, freedom of the press, and the rule of law—have been under attack in many countries. Freedom House classified just 45 percent of countries as “Free,” with another 30 percent classi-

From Subject to Citizen

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