Brussels Democracy Dialogue 2024: How to transition to sustainable democracies?

In response to the rise of leaders with autocratic tendencies in advanced democracies, creeping autocratisation in many democracies previously considered consolidated, and faltering democratisation processes in South-eastern and Eastern Europe, the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung EU Office Brussels and FES Democracy of the Future Office Vienna are organising the first Brussels Democracy Dialogue on 20 November 2024. Just like Hambach Democracy Dialogue (HDD),  this expert conference is a platform to exchange progressive ideas and proposals for further developing European democracies.

Focussing on the topic of successful democratisation processes, the first Brussels Democracy Dialogue will address how transitions to sustainable democracies can succeed. At the onset of the third way of democratisation, social-science research has identified four key factors from which the success of democratisation was supposed to depend:

1. socio-economic aspects that favour the development and stability of democracy (e.g. a prosperous economy, a low level of inequality);
2. the existence of a liberal and democratic tradition (e.g. pre-authoritarian social movements, organised interests, and a democratic-parliamentary culture) that facilitates the entrenchment of liberal and democratic values in the society;
3. a political elite that is committed to democratic norms and principles;
4. strong international democracy supporters that make the external costs of authoritarianism high.

Together with politicians, experts in democracy, and representatives of civil society, we will re-assess the validity of these factors that have been regarded as essential for the transition to democracy and its survival. In four panels, we will 1) rethink the relationship between democracy and the economy, we will ask 2) why liberal and democratic values did not take deep roots everywhere, we will analyse 3) the role of political actors in subverting and defending democracy, and we will discuss 4) the role of international organisations in supporting democracy in times of de-democratisation. 

With: Martin Schulz (President of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung), Sabine Fandrych (Secretary General of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung), Jan Teorell (Stockholm University and Founder of V-Dem),  Philip Gorski (Yale University), Susan Stokes (Center on Democracy, University of Chicago), Giovanni Capoccia (Oxford University), Andreas Schedler (Democracy Institute, Central European University), Sarah Bush (University of Pennsylvania), Maya Tudor (Oxford University), Ivan Krastev (Institute for Human Sciences), and many more.

Our moderator will be Jacki Davis, Senior Adviser at the European Policy Centre (EPC)