election

As the UN Secretary General calls the coronavirus “the greatest test after the Second World War”, in South Korea similar terms have been common to describe the sobering primacy of the 1997-98 Asian Financial Crisis; so psychologically traumatic to be widely considered as the most tragic national event since the Korean War (1950-53). The daunting memory of the AFC crisis, then surged as yardstick against which every successive economic downturn has been assessed.

On 27 January a petition was filed to South Korea’s Blue House. It counted half a million signatories, and aimed at banishing visitors from China in an effort to escape the coronavirus epidemic. It was a different world back then. The coronavirus was not a pandemic yet, and Seoul had only four cases on record, all of them imported from China.

“Every election in Ukraine is a crucial one”, so goes the joke among Ukraine experts, east and west. Just like with any joke, there’s some truth behind it. In the post-Soviet landscape, the country has always stood out as relatively pluralistic: its politics, though never completely democratic, are highly competitive, and its civil society is habitually described as “vibrant”.^[1]

The March 31st Presidential elections in Ukraine matter for Ukraine, its region and the EU. While the majority of experts deem it impossible for a winner to be declared in the first round and, thus, expect a second one in April, the March contest will be a first important step in the crucial process to determine the direction the country will take. So, while we should not hold our breath on election day, we should definitely keep a close eye on the contest and its outcome.

Many Afghans are still wondering what exactly they will vote for on Saturday, and whether all of them will. While despite all shortcomings, parliamentary polls will go ahead on 20 October, the originally – and very optimistically – scheduled first-ever district council elections will apparently not be held.

The 7 October elections are the most uncertain presidential elections in Brazil in 20 years. It could not have been otherwise after four turbulent years, with the impeachment of the president, Dilma Rousseff, the corruption scandals, the arrest of Lula da Silva and the rise of a far-right outsider who has literally routed all his cards.

For further analysis on this by the DGAP, see here

On the 3rd of July the two German Christian democratic parties, the Christian Democratic Union, CDU, and the Christian Social Union, CSU, presented their common electoral manifesto for the federal election that will take place on 24th of September 2017. The document is titled “For a Germany that is good to live in” (Für ein Deutschland, in dem wir gut und gerne leben). The CSU added a “Plan for Bavaria” (Bayernplan) that is not considered in this paper.

There is no doubt that the pro-Kremlin disinformation campaign is an orchestrated strategy, delivering the same disinformation stories in as many languages as possible, through as many channels as possible, and as often as possible.