Why The Conversation needs your help to build a better informed, more cohesive democracy

By Misha Ketchell, Editor, The Conversation

Back in 1992, US political scientist Francis Fukuyama announced the end of history as a process of evolution and predicted the world would embrace Western liberal democracy.

Democracy’s downward trajectory over the following three decades is best summed up by the character in a Hemingway novel who described the process of going bankrupt as “gradual, then sudden”.

Already in 2024 we have seen several populist and authoritarian leaders across the world succeed by leaning into conspiracy theories, misinformation and disinformation. Sydney University democracy expert

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