Has the Philippines been gripped by a "powerful authoritarian undertow" that's gradually choking democracy in countries from Thailand, Venezuela to Poland and South Africa?

"A number of countries typically counted as democracies today -- including Georgia, Mozambique, the Philippines, and Senegal -- may have slipped below the threshold," due to shoddy governance and corrupted electoral processes, says the March-April issue of the influential quarterly: "Foreign Affairs".

Larry Diamond, Hoover Institution senior fellow, wrote the analysis titled: "Democratic Rollback: Resurgence of Predatory State." Diamond picks up from where "Deepening Democracy in A Fragmented World" study left off in 2002.

Democracy's revolution of rising expectations, seen in the toppling, of dictators - from Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines to Alberto Fujimori in Peru - had curdled into an uprising of frustrated hopes, this UN Human Development Report noted then. "Of the 81 countries that have taken steps to democratization, only 47 are considered full democracies. Many do not seem to be in transition to anything. (Some) lapsed back into authoritarianism."

Despite setbacks, democratization continued. The "Cedar Revolution" in Lebanon peacefully drove out Syrian troops. Iraqis voted for the first time in nearly half a century.

But democratic gains then came primarily in smaller and weaker states. "In large, strategically important countries, such as Nigeria and Russia, expansion of executive power, intimidation of the opposition, and rigging of the electoral process extinguished even the most basic form of electoral democracy"

A January 2008 Freedom House survey found that, for the first time since 1994, freedom around the world suffered a net decline in two successive years. This was the "worst since the fall of the Berlin Wall."

"Celebrations of democracy's triumph are premature," Diamond notes. "The world has slipped into a democratic recession. Most newcomers to the democratic club (and some long-standing members) have performed poorly".

Even success stories, like Chile, Ghana or Poland, and South Africa, grappled with festering problems of governance and disaffection. Democratic India today is surrounded by politically unstable, undemocratic states. And aspirations for democratic progress have been thwarted widely in the Arab world.

Emerging democracies must contain crime and corruption, generate economic growth, relieve economic inequality, and secure the rule of law. Otherwise, people will turn to authoritarian alternatives. Western policymakers can help reverse the democratic recession by going beyond the façade of electoral democracy" and making aid contingent on good governance.

In many countries, democracy has "been a superficial phenomenon, blighted by abusive police and security forces, domineering local oligarchies, incompetent and state bureaucracies, corrupt inaccessible judiciaries, and venal ruling elites.

"Many people, -- especially the poor, -- are citizens only in name. (They) have few meaningful channels of political participation. There are elections, but they are contests between corrupt, "clientelistic" parties. Parliaments and local governments do not represent broad constituencies but power blocs.. There are constitutions, but not constitutionalism.

Thus, in Thailand, voters (especially in the countryside) have turned repeatedly to a softer autocrat by electing Thaksin Shinawatra, whom the military overthrew in September 2006 only to see his party reemerge triumphant in the December 2007 elections".

Where democracy survives, it often labors under serious difficulties. In most regions, majorities support democracy as the best form of government in principle. But substantial minorities toy with tauthoritarian option.

In much of the "democratic world", citizens lack confidence that politicians, political parties, or government officials are serving anyone other than themselves.

Viability of democracy hinges to some degree on economic development. But in most poor countries, "economy first" advocates put the cart before the horse. Without improved governance, economic growth will not take off or be sustainable.

By condoning massive corruption, ethnic favoritism, and electoral malpractice, Kenya's President Mwai Kibaki, for example, brought a promising new democracy to the brink of chaos.

"In the coming decade, the fate of democracy will be determined not by the whittling down remaining dictatorships. It will be set by how "at-risk democracies" like Kenya or the Philippines perform - or fail.

There are more than 50 at-risk democracies today. These include four of the of eight democracies in Asia, most Latin America and Caribbean nations, all of the post-Soviet democracies that do not belong to the European Union, plus virtually all of the democracies in Africa. At-risk democracies are plagued by poor governance. Some appear so trapped in patterns of corrupt and abusive rule, that's it become "a natural condition." Cynical elites do everything to stay in power -whether corrupting elections or skimming more profit.

"The result is a predatory state," Diamond writes. "Predatory states cannot sustain democracy for sustainable democracy requires constitutionalism, compromise. And the most (blatant) predatory states produce predatory societies. The most urgent task of the next decade is to shore up democracy in these countries."

(E-mail: juan_mercado@boholchronicle.com)