Liberal democracy in the 21st century has become far more the norm than the exceptional form of rule.

Since the 19th century, liberal democracies have grown in number, at first gradually and fitfully, then exponentially since the 1980s. So dramatic was the global rise in democratic rule by the early 1990s, it was thought to be more or less the inevitable end-state of all remaining autocracies.

Like the Energizer Bunny, once the wave of democracy is set in motion, it just keeps going—or so the theory.

Over this past decade, there’s been an actual slide, however, in liberalism globally, recorded by Freedom House. This has been matched by rising uncertainty about the particular value of democratic governance more generally.

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