Human Rights Watch warns the world is in a “democratic recession,” with roughly three-quarters of people now living under autocratic rule — a concentration of authoritarianism not seen since the 1980s. In its annual country-by-country review, HRW’s executive director Philippe Bolopion says the institutions that protect human rights are “in peril,” and calls the rise of authoritarianism the defining challenge of a generation.
HRW identifies 2025 as a tipping point for rights and freedoms in the United States. The organisation says the first year of the Trump administration mounted a broad assault on democratic pillars and the postwar rules-based order the US helped build. HRW documents a steady erosion of checks and balances designed to limit executive power and safeguard rights, pointing to examples such as President Trump’s proposals to “nationalise” US voting systems and recent disclosures about a $500 million investment by an Emirati royal into the Trump family’s cryptocurrency company.
The report details a pattern of actions that, HRW says, undermine electoral trust, weaken accountability, attack judicial independence, flout court orders, and use state power to intimidate political opponents. Targets include the press, law firms, universities, civil society organisations and even comedians. HRW also highlights limits on free speech and policies that lead to deportations to countries where returnees may face torture, arguing these measures together constitute an assault on the rule of law.
Those developments in Washington have global repercussions when combined with long-term efforts by Russia and China to weaken international norms. Bolopion warns that under pressure from the US administration, and persistently undermined by Beijing and Moscow, the rules-based international order is being strained, threatening the architecture human rights defenders rely on. He says President Trump has at times dismissed the relevance of international law, relying instead on his own judgments.
HRW criticises the UK as well, saying Britain repeatedly chipped away at rights in 2025. The report singles out the Labour government’s punitive immigration policies for normalising anti-migrant rhetoric and emboldening the far right, and condemns crackdowns on protest freedoms and inadequate responses to the cost-of-living crisis. The organisation also notes a broader European trend of anti-migrant narratives affecting countries such as France and Germany, and argues that inflammatory rhetoric from the US can feed and flirt with far-right ideas in Europe.
HRW stresses that the democratic recession predates any one leader and has been building for decades: democracy indicators are back to roughly 1985 levels, with about 72% of the world’s population now under autocratic regimes. That trend, coupled with weakening international norms, creates a “perfect storm” that endangers human rights globally.
To respond, Bolopion urges democracies — including the UK, the EU and Canada — to form a strategic alliance to defend the rules-based order. He envisions a coalition that could use economic incentives, counter policies that undermine multilateral trade governance and human rights, and act as a united force at the United Nations. He also emphasises the essential role of civil society in resisting authoritarian trends, calling this a moment for collective action rather than despair.
Despite the bleak assessment, HRW points to signs of resistance: protests against federal immigration agents in Minneapolis after deadly shootings, sustained demonstrations in Iran that began over economic collapse and expanded into broader political demands, and Gen Z-led protests in Morocco over underfunded healthcare and education. These movements, HRW says, offer reasons for hope amid a dangerous new era for rights and freedoms.