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Democracy

Scholar Traces Peru's Decade of Political Instability to "Democratic Hollowing"

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On May 15, the Stanford Society for Latin American Politics (SSLAP) and the Democracy Action Lab (DAL) at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) co-hosted Professor Alberto Vergara for a discussion on “Democratic Hollowing in Peru: The Underexplored Pathway of Democratic Erosion” as part of the DAL series Democracy at the Ballot Box: The 2026 Electoral Cycle in Latin America. The talk offered key reflections on Peru's political trajectory over the past decade and the emerging threats to its democracy.

Peru's 2026 General Elections


Over the past decade, Peru has had eight presidents — a clear indicator of ongoing political and institutional instability driven by recurrent impeachments by the Peruvian Congress. As a result, there has been massive social unrest, state repression, and an unprecedented rise in organized criminal activity. 

Peru held general elections April 12-13, 2026. On the morning of May 15, the National Office of Electoral Processes (ONPE) confirmed the presidential runoff election on June 7 between Keiko Fujimori, leader of the right-wing populist party Fuerza Popular, and Roberto Sánchez of Juntos por el Perú, a left-wing coalition. This runoff closely resembles the 2021 election, when Fujimori faced Pedro Castillo in a highly polarized contest. However, the electoral process itself revealed the depth of democratic deterioration. The release of official results took about one month due to serious logistical failures by ONPE. Problems distributing electoral materials in several districts of Lima forced voting to extend into a second day, further undermining confidence in an already fragile electoral process.

Almost a week after Peru's runoff election, the country did not have official results of who would take office as president on July 28 (Independence Day). With 98% of votes counted, the June 7 runoff between Keiko Fujimori and Roberto Sánchez has revealed a highly polarized election, with a vote difference of only 0.008%. Early in the week, as vote counting began, Sánchez appeared to hold a lead. However, the results shifted dramatically when election officials began processing ballots from over 309,000 Peruvians living abroad across 73 countries. This shift has put Fujimori ahead, yet without any official declaration from ONPE, the result remains deeply contested. As Peruvians say, it is better to “no cantar victoria” — don't claim victory yet.

ONPE election results graphic for Peru's 2026 general elections, with 99.64% of ballots processed. Keiko Fujimori (Fuerza Popular) leads with 17.17% and 2,867,638 votes, followed by Roberto Sánchez (Juntos por el Perú) with 12.00% and 2,004,207 votes, a gap of 863,431 votes. Rafael López A. (Renovación Popular) is third with 11.91% and 1,989,515 votes, trailing Sánchez by 14,692 votes.

ONPE's near-final tally of Peru's 2026 general election, with 99.64% of ballots processed, showed Keiko Fujimori leading Roberto Sánchez and Rafael López A. ahead of the June 7 runoff. Credit: La Republicá

Democratic Hollowing 


Alberto Vergara, along with his colleague Rodrigo Barnechea, introduced a new key political concept, democratic hollowing, to better explain Peru's democratic erosion and the political crisis during the past decade. Most of the current academic literature argues that “democracy backsliding” occurs when there is a structural shift toward authoritarianism and the concentration of power in the hands of a lone strongman or a political party. Across Latin America, this trend has been particularly visible in Venezuela under Chavismo, in Nicaragua under Daniel Ortega, and in Cuba under Communist Party rule. In Peru, however, Vergara argues that democracy can also die through the dissolution of power, which he calls democratic hollowing. This political landscape has been shaped by fragmented political parties, amateur politicians with no long-term incentives, and a weakened rule of law, producing chronic, self-reinforcing political instability.

Politicians do not get into office because of a past career. And they know that they will most likely not have a future either. They don't have a past; they don't have a future; they have a present — and they must maximize what they can grab today.
Prof. Alberto Vergara

Therefore, weak political representation and breaches of the rule of law have disincentivized the current political system from protecting and representing Peruvian citizens' interests. During the lethal repression of the 2022 and 2023 protests in Peru, under Dina Boluarte's regime, the Peruvian police and army left around 50 civilian protesters dead and more than 1400 people injured. These acts remained unpunished, with no justice delivered and no reparations provided to the victims or their families. Vergara argues that control over the judiciary becomes essential because politicians are implicated in informal or criminal activity, and in the outgoing Congress, 68 of 130 congressmen were under judicial investigation; in the current one, 60, for crimes including money laundering, criminal organization, and rape.

There are three main characteristics of democratic hollowing that Vergara has included:

Electoral fragmentation: Political parties have become "mere legal entities" with no real roots in society, and politicians have learned to rely on personal resources and reputations rather than party structures to get elected. The result is a system where loyalty to parties is almost nonexistent, politicians split off and regroup constantly, and each electoral cycle effectively “resets” the political landscape. The current Congress includes members from 12 different political parties and 11 unaffiliated congressmen. 

Personalistic amateurism: Amateurism arises from the lack of established political parties that do not sustain political careers. Presidents Boluarte, Castillo, Sagasti, Merino, Vizcarra, and Kuczynski all had almost no political experience before the presidency. Without organizational ties or long-term incentives, these amateurs are prone to miscalculation, predatory behavior, and short-term rent-seeking that deepens Peru's institutional decay with every new government.

Absence of political linkages: Since Fujimori's authoritarian regime and the collapse of the party system, political parties have been replaced not by political identities but by "anti-identities.” Vergara argues that the most stable bond between politicians and citizens is not a shared agenda but a shared rejection, whether of Fujimorismo or, more recently, of the left. This is precisely what he observes in the current election. Rather than offering a vision or a program, both runoff candidates campaign purely on the message that the other is worse. Parties that are little more than names on a poster cannot hold politicians accountable, and outsiders who reach office have nothing to sustain them once they get there — no organization, no ideology, no base. The result is a political system where representation is performed but never actually delivered.

It looks very hard to imagine that these elections, whoever is elected, will alter the trajectory in which the country is involved. The elections do not look like a turning point, but rather as another instance of a path marked by instability.
Prof. Alberto Vergara

Professor Alberto Vergara's discussion of democratic hollowing in Peru invites us to reflect on how practices such as impunity, lack of access to justice, rent-seeking, and repeated breaches of the rule of law continue to be institutionalized. In this context, elections function only as a “band-aid” that, once removed, reveals the nation’s underlying fracture. Unfortunately, these patterns are historically rooted in the fact that “equality before the law never took deep root in Peru.” The State has never credibly guaranteed equal civil and political rights, which has deeply weakened citizens’ trust in institutions. This distrust is reinforced when those who claim to protect citizens are often the same actors who repress them during protests, or favor laws on illegal mining, criminal organizations, and money laundering. While these structural problems persist, Peruvians continue working hard to sustain their households amid growing insecurity and the rise of organized crime, often without any guarantee that they will return home safely. Ultimately, Peru’s democratic hollowing is not only a political crisis but a social reality that shapes everyday life, exposing the fragility of democracy and the urgent need for a state that can truly guarantee justice, representation, and security for all.

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Alberto Vergara addresses a largely student audience at Stanford during his talk on democratic hallowing on May 15, 2026.
Alberto Vergara addresses a largely student audience at Stanford during his talk on democratic hallowing on May 15, 2026. | Nora Sulots
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Political scientist Alberto Vergara argues Peru's crisis stems not from a power grab, but from the dissolution of power itself.

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  • Peru's 2026 elections exposed deep democratic strain, with a month-long delay in results and a razor-thin 0.008% margin between runoff candidates Keiko Fujimori and Roberto Sánchez.
  • Political scientist Alberto Vergara argues Peru is experiencing "democratic hollowing" rather than backsliding — democracy eroding through the dissolution of power rather than its concentration.
  • Three forces drive this hollowing, per Vergara: electoral fragmentation, personalistic amateurism among politicians with no long-term stake in office, and the replacement of political identities with shared "anti-identities."
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What a DAL Panel Got Right About Colombia's Election — and What It Didn't See Coming

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Héctor Fuentes
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Less than 24 hours after Colombians cast their first-round ballots in the presidential election, CDDRL’s Democracy Action Lab (DAL) convened four scholars for a webinar launching its new series, “Democracy at the Ballot Box: The 2026 Electoral Cycle in Latin America.” Alberto Díaz-Cayeros, DAL's co-director, moderated a conversation with Michael Weintraub (Universidad de los Andes, director of CESED, the Center for the Study of Security and Drugs), Javier Mejía Cubillos (Stanford University, Department of Political Science and the Stanford Civics Initiative), Oliver Kaplan (University of Denver's Korbel School, 2025-26 Visiting Scholar at CDDRL), and María Ignacia Curiel (Stanford University, research scholar at CDDRL and research manager of DAL).

The election results were jarring. Abelardo de la Espriella, an independent lawyer running hard on security, had taken 43.75 percent of the vote to Iván Cepeda's 40.90 percent — with Uribista Paloma Valencia a distant third at roughly 7 percent, and centrists Sergio Fajardo and Claudia López splitting another 5 percent between them. A runoff was set for June 21. The panel had one day to make sense of it.

The numbers and the map beneath them


Weintraub opened with data he had scraped that morning, and the maps told a story of a country voting almost exactly along the lines it already knew. Cepeda's support mapped with striking precision onto Gustavo Petro's 2022 coalition — he flipped essentially no municipality where the combined right-wing vote had exceeded Petro's four years earlier — while De la Espriella's strength traced the same geography as the “No” vote in Colombia's 2016 referendum on the FARC peace agreement. Turnout, oddly, had risen more in Petro's 2022 strongholds than in the right's, which Weintraub read less as good news for Cepeda than as a sign his coalition may already be close to its ceiling, with more untapped voters available to De la Espriella heading into the runoff. Modeling out several scenarios for how Valencia's, Fajardo's, and López's voters might split, most of his projections had De la Espriella winning comfortably — though, as he noted, Colombian elections have a way of moving in the three weeks between rounds.

What the numbers don't show


Mejía pushed back on two points he felt the quantitative read was missing. First, the Pacto Histórico's cohesion: a Colombian left with a long history of fragmentation had, remarkably, stayed unified behind a famously self-centered leader in Petro — though Mejía flagged early signs that some in the movement were quietly urging Cepeda to distance himself, a tension he expected to shape the run-up to the runoff and, potentially, Colombian politics well past this election cycle.

Second, and more pointedly, Mejía argued against reading De la Espriella as simply Colombia's version of an internationally franchised populism — Bukele, Milei, Trump — with the usual explanations about fear and security anxiety layered on top. There's some of that, he allowed. But he made the case that De la Espriella had tapped something more specifically Colombian: a cultural premium on hard work as the individual, personally-earned marker of social standing — a value Mejía argued Petrismo's more abstract, structural language about labor and capital simply doesn't speak to — paired with a live-and-let-live, self-reliant streak that runs across class lines. He pointed to a viral interview De la Espriella gave the streamer Westcol, where he defended a truck driver's right to carry a gun against highway robbers in strikingly plain, non-ideological terms, as the clearest illustration of a message landing well beyond the demographic most analysts assumed was his base.

A clean vote, an anxious moment


Kaplan drew on firsthand observation, having been in Colombia both eighteen months earlier and again just weeks before the vote, where he watched supporters of every camp convince themselves their candidate would win. He was careful to note the good news first: Colombia's electoral authority and EU observers both called the vote clean, turnout was strong, and — in a detail that made the local news cycle that morning — Colombian voters get paid time off work for each round they vote in. But the deeper story, in his read, was a political system whipsawed by unmet expectations since the 2016 peace deal, Petro's stalled “total peace” negotiations, and a personal, legal feud between Cepeda and former president Álvaro Uribe layered on top of an election that had become, in effect, a referendum on Petro himself. Cepeda's central problem, Kaplan argued, echoed Kamala Harris's in the 2024 U.S. election: tied to an unpopular incumbent's record without ever having been able to fully break from it. Whether he could move toward the center — a softer task against De la Espriella than it might have been against the more centrist Valencia — was, in Kaplan's view, the pivotal question of the next three weeks. He closed by naming the deeper worry running under both campaigns: real, if differently shaped, concerns about what either winner might do to Colombia's political institutions.

A regional pattern, and a geopolitical wildcard


Curiel widened the lens. She was careful not to flatten every recent right-populist surge in Latin America into a single story, but she argued it's hard to ignore a regional pattern all the same — strikingly similar candidates, rhetorical strategies, and now fraud allegations recurring across countries (Honduras, Peru, Bolivia among them) whose underlying security and political problems differ substantially. She suggested it might be worth studying today's crop of outsider-right figures the way scholars once studied the diffusion of Latin America's leftist movements in the 1960s and '70s — as a phenomenon with its own cross-border mechanics, not just parallel domestic stories.

On the United States, Curiel expected rhetorical engagement from the Trump administration — De la Espriella is an open admirer who had already met with Trump officials in Miami — but was skeptical it would prove decisive; Cepeda, by contrast, might govern more in the pragmatic, arm's-length mode of Mexico's Claudia Sheinbaum, building on the more accommodating turn Petro's own relationship with Washington had taken since earlier in the year. She also flagged a looming energy question neither candidate had addressed in any detail: an anticipated El Niño-driven drop in hydroelectric capacity, and the resulting scramble for imported natural gas — from the United States or, potentially, Venezuela — that whoever won would inherit almost immediately. And she pointed to a genuine irony in De la Espriella's biography: a right-wing candidate whose past legal work had tied him personally to a figure associated with the Maduro government, complicating any simple ideological reading of what a De la Espriella presidency would mean for Colombia–Venezuela relations.

Where the center went, and what comes next


The discussion that followed ranged widely: why Paloma Valencia's campaign collapsed after polling near 20 percent just weeks earlier (the panel's rough consensus: a hard right that structurally tends to outflank the establishment right across the region, compounded by a Petrista strategy that concentrated its fire on De la Espriella as the tougher runoff opponent, leaving Valencia to absorb collateral damage); whether Colombia's center had simply disappeared with the 2016 peace agreement; and how much weight to put on U.S. involvement or even World Cup-driven national sentiment as runoff wildcards. Nobody thought either would be decisive on its own.

Asked directly what a De la Espriella or a Cepeda presidency would mean for the health of Colombian democracy, Weintraub was candid about his concern — less because either candidate is uniquely dangerous, he said, than because Colombia's political system has grown exhausted, its 1991 constitutional settlement showing diminishing returns and a public “willing to experiment” after the unfulfilled promise of Petro's own presidency. Curiel and Kaplan both located genuine grounds for hope in the same place: an unusually fragmented political landscape, without a single unchallenged caudillo on either side, and courts and regulatory institutions that had — so far — held their independence through repeated stress tests. On violence specifically, the panel's closing predictions diverged by scenario. Under De la Espriella, Weintraub and Kaplan worried that a rupture in Petro's ongoing peace talks would trigger retaliatory violence, that a return to aerial coca fumigation would collide head-on with the Constitutional Court, and that elite or paramilitary backlash would follow if Cepeda had instead pursued land reform and a constituent assembly. Under Cepeda, the concern ran more toward armed groups continuing to exploit ceasefires and extortion economies, and toward the durability of institutional checks on a government still tied to Petro's unfinished agenda.

Díaz-Cayeros closed the session on a note that has stayed with the panel since: a viewer's comment in the chat had framed the choice as one between “the devil you know and the devil you don't.” Fair enough, he said — but democracy remains one of the few systems humanity has built that lets a society get rid of either devil, peacefully, and try again.

Postscript: what actually happened


Set against the news since, the panel's read holds up better in its worries than in its point estimates.

The margin was the first surprise. Weintraub's scenario modeling, built the morning after round one, had De la Espriella winning comfortably in most transfer scenarios. The actual runoff, held as scheduled on June 21, was instead a nail-biter: 49.66 percent to 48.70 percent, a gap of roughly 246,000 votes out of some 26 million cast — under one percentage point, and close enough that Cepeda initially declined to concede, contesting results from close to a quarter of polling stations before formally accepting the outcome on June 24 with a pledge to “exercise a democratic, vigilant and constructive opposition.” Election night itself brought clashes between protesters and police in Cali, an early sign of the social tension the panel had flagged as a risk under either outcome.

Weintraub's own post-election analysis, published the day of the runoff, put hard numbers behind the panel's “entrenched spatial blocks” thesis — and, in the process, revised one of the panel's own central premises. Only 26 of Colombia's more than eleven hundred municipalities changed which candidate won between the two rounds (14 flipping to De la Espriella, 12 to Cepeda), and nearly all of those flips came in places that were already razor-thin in round one. The country that voted for De la Espriella — Norte de Santander at 77 percent, Casanare at 69, Santander at 65, Antioquia at 64 — and the country that voted for Cepeda — Chocó and Vaupés both above 80 percent, Putumayo at 79, Nariño at 77, Cauca at 76 — barely overlapped at all. Bogotá told a version of the story Weintraub had flagged live on the panel, now with exact numbers: Cepeda carried the capital 52.5 percent to 45.4, a margin of about 302,000 votes, solid but well short of what Petro had won there in 2022, even as Cepeda gained ground in every other major city between rounds — up 8.7 points in Medellín, 8.2 in Cali, 8.0 in Cartagena, 7.1 in Barranquilla.

The more important correction concerns the “pivotal center” the panel spent so much of its discussion on the day after round one — the roughly 2.8 million voters who had backed Valencia, Fajardo, and López. Weintraub's later numbers show both campaigns' gains between rounds exceeded that entire pool on their own: De la Espriella added nearly 2.6 million votes beyond his first-round total, more than Valencia's whole first-round universe by itself, while Cepeda added over 3 million, more than the combined Fajardo-López vote. The runoff, in other words, wasn't decided mainly by which side won over centrist defectors but by each campaign's ability to pull entirely new voters to the polls, a dynamic already visible in round one, when turnout had risen 2.25 million over 2022, disproportionately in Cepeda's Caribbean and Pacific strongholds. Between rounds, turnout climbed further, up 5.6 points to 63.5 percent (3.6 million more voters than the 2022 runoff), and Cepeda's operation mobilized more of them in absolute terms than De la Espriella's. It simply wasn't enough to close a gap that had already opened in round one. As Weintraub summarized: De la Espriella won a close, high-turnout election on the strength of an intact regional coalition plus modest gains in the center; Cepeda outgrew his first-round vote proportionally, but never closed the gap he faced.

Washington reacted exactly as Curiel expected, if more enthusiastically than her cautious framing implied: Trump declared on Truth Social that De la Espriella had “Won, BIG!,” and Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the president-elect to discuss regional security cooperation, immigration, and trade. Precisely, the rhetorical engagement Curiel predicted, delivered with more warmth than skepticism.

Despite initial post-election tensions, transfer of power went ahead on schedule, if uneasily. De la Espriella was sworn in on August 7, not in Bogotá, but in Cali, under an unprecedented security operation of some 11,000 troops and a drone ban, with Javier Milei and José Antonio Kast among the foreign leaders in attendance.

On policy, the new president has moved fast to confirm Weintraub's most specific fears. He has vowed to end the Petro government's peace negotiations with armed groups, resume aerial fumigation of coca crops (a practice suspended for more than a decade), and the exact flashpoint Weintraub predicted would trigger a “choque” with the Constitutional Court — and expand the military's role against criminal organizations, alongside new large-scale prison construction. Analysts are now warning, in terms that echo Weintraub and Kaplan's closing remarks almost exactly, that abandoning negotiations could backfire: an estimated 27,000 members of armed groups currently have no reintegration pathway if talks collapse entirely. On foreign policy, De la Espriella has aligned closely with the Trump administration, backing its military strikes on suspected drug vessels in the Caribbean, expediting extraditions, severing relations with Cuba, and restoring ties with Israel. 

Six weeks into the new administration, the question the panel closed on that afternoon has stopped being hypothetical and started being lived: can Colombia's institutions absorb what comes next? It's the story DAL's "Democracy at the Ballot Box" series intends to keep following.

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Venezuela After Maduro, Explained

A Democracy Action Lab panel weighed competing scenarios for Venezuela’s political future amid elite continuity, economic crisis, and international intervention.
Venezuela After Maduro, Explained
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A man in a Colombian football jersey casts his vote in the presidential election on May 31, 2026, in Bogotá, Colombia.
A man in a Colombian football jersey casts his vote in the presidential election on May 31, 2026, in Bogotá, Colombia. | Leonardo Castañeda/Getty Images
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Convened one day after the first round, four scholars forecast a referendum on Petro's presidency and a system running out of patience. The vote that followed was far closer than their models predicted.

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A man in a Colombian football jersey casts his vote in the presidential election on May 31, 2026, in Bogotá, Colombia.
Caption A man in a Colombian football jersey casts his vote in the presidential election on May 31, 2026, in Bogotá, Colombia. | Photo credit Leonardo Castañeda/Getty Images
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  • One day after Colombia's first-round vote, four scholars from CDDRL's Democracy Action Lab and partner institutions analyzed the results and projected a comfortable win for Abelardo de la Espriella.
  • Their broader diagnosis — that Colombia's political system was showing diminishing returns after years of unmet expectations — held up better than their projected margin, as the runoff was decided by under one percentage point.
  • Since taking office, the new administration has ended peace talks and resumed coca fumigation, triggering a clash with the Constitutional Court that one panelist had specifically predicted.
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Call for Applications: CDDRL 2027-28 Pre- & Postdoctoral Fellowships

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Nora Sulots
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The Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law is pleased to invite applications from pre-doctoral students at the write-up stage and from post-doctoral scholars working in any of the four program areas of democracy, development, evaluating the efficacy of democracy promotion, and rule of law. The application cycle for the 2027-2028 academic year will be open from Monday, September 21, 2026, through Monday, November 30, 2026.

Our goal is to provide an intellectually dynamic environment that fosters lively exchange among Center members and helps everyone to do excellent scholarship. Fellows will spend the academic year at Stanford University focusing on research and data analysis as they work to finalize and publish their dissertation research while connecting with resident faculty and research staff at CDDRL.

Pre-doctoral fellows must be enrolled currently in a doctoral program or equivalent through the time of intended residency at Stanford and must be at the dissertation write-up (post-coursework) phase of their doctoral program. Post-doctoral fellows must have earned their Ph.D. within 3 years of the start of the fellowship, or plan to have successfully defended their Ph.D. dissertations by July 31, 2027.

In addition to our regular call for applications, CDDRL invites applications for the following fellowships:


Gerhard Casper Fellow in Rule of Law: We welcome research on any aspect of rule of law, including judicial politics, criminal justice, and the politicization of judicial institutions. We are an interdisciplinary center; candidates from any relevant field (i.e., the social sciences, law) are welcome to apply. This is a 9-month, residential fellowship, and the Gerhard Casper Fellow will be part of CDDRL’s larger cohort of pre- and postdoctoral fellows. Please apply through the CDDRL fellowship application process and indicate that you would like to be considered for the Gerhard Casper Rule of Law Fellowship.

Jan Koum Israel Studies Program Fellow: We welcome research on any aspect of modern Israel, including Israeli politics, constitutionalism, economics, society, diplomacy, and international affairs. We are an interdisciplinary center; candidates from any relevant field (i.e., the social sciences and law) are welcome to apply. This is a 9-month, residential fellowship, and the Jan Koum Israel Studies Program Fellow will be part of CDDRL’s larger cohort of pre- and postdoctoral fellows. Please apply through the regular CDDRL fellowship application process and indicate that you would like to be considered for the Jan Koum Israel Studies Program Fellowship.

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Maria Nagawa presents during the 2025 Global Development Postdoctoral Fellows Conference.
Maria Nagawa presents during the 2025 Global Development Postdoctoral Fellows Conference.
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The Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law welcomes applications from pre-doctoral students at the write-up stage and from post-doctoral scholars working in any of the four program areas of democracy, development, evaluating the efficacy of democracy promotion, and rule of law.

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Democracy Action Lab Lanza Oficialmente La Primera Cohorte de The Democracy Garage

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Héctor Fuentes
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El Democracy Action Lab (DAL), una iniciativa del Centro sobre Democracia, Desarrollo y Estado de Derecho de la Universidad de Stanford para defensores de la democracia, se enorgullece en anunciar oficialmente la primera cohorte de The Democracy Garage, el primer programa acelerador de su tipo dedicado a fortalecer a los defensores de la democracia en primera línea en América Latina y el Caribe.

The Democracy Garage nació de una convicción simple pero urgente: la resiliencia democrática no se construye únicamente a través de ideas, sino a través del fortalecimiento de capacidades de la sociedad civil para actuar estratégicamente, usar la evidencia con eficacia, comunicar de manera persuasiva y adaptarse a entornos políticos en rápida evolución. DAL construyó este programa para cerrar una brecha persistente en el apoyo a la democracia, tendiendo un puente entre la investigación de alto nivel y las necesidades operativas en tiempo real de las organizaciones que hacen el trabajo más difícil sobre el terreno.

Durante los próximos meses, DAL trabajará codo a codo con ocho extraordinarias organizaciones en la región, aplicando una metodología estructurada de acelerador para co-desarrollar estrategias adaptadas a los desafíos democráticos específicos de cada país. Este no es un programa de crecimiento tradicional: es una asociación profunda y colaborativa basada en la evidencia, la estrategia y la solidaridad.

Un Modelo Acelerador de Tres Ejes


El modelo acelerador de The Democracy Garage se organiza en torno a tres ejes que se refuerzan mutuamente, diseñados para abordar una brecha clave en el ecosistema de apoyo democrático: muchos programas ofrecen formación de alto nivel desconectada de las necesidades inmediatas, o asistencia técnica a corto plazo que no genera capacidad duradera. The Garage tiende ese puente.

Eje 1  |  Análisis de Evidencia para la Estrategia Democrática  —  Asesoría Práctica

El primer eje proporciona apoyo de asesoría directa, orientada a los problemas. Cada organización  entra al Garage con un desafío concreto y actual. DAL moviliza su capacidad analítica — incluyendo la experiencia de su cuerpo docente, la participación de estudiantes y herramientas de datos — para abordarlo de forma colaborativa. No se trata de asistencia técnica unidireccional: es un proceso conjunto que desarrolla la propia capacidad de las organizaciones para usar la evidencia como herramienta estratégica, transitando de modos reactivos a anticipatorios.

Eje 2  |  Formación y Fortalecimiento de Capacidades  —  Cuatro Áreas Fundamentales

El segundo eje ofrece formación estructurada en cuatro áreas críticas para la acción democrática: (1) Estrategia para la defensa democrática — comprender el estado de la democracia en la región y sus principales desafíos; (2) IA para el activismo — aplicaciones prácticas de la inteligencia artificial para monitoreo, comunicación y toma de decisiones; (3) Evidencia para la defensa democrática — recolección, análisis e interpretación de datos vinculados directamente a las decisiones estratégicas; y (4) Narrativa para el cambio — traducir el análisis complejo en narrativas persuasivas que resuenen con tomadores de decisiones, medios de comunicación y ciudadanos.

Eje 3  |  Construcción de Plataformas para la Defensa Democrática  —  Escalar el Impacto Sistémico

El tercer eje apoya a las organizaciones  para que se conviertan en nodos fundacionales de plataformas nacionales de defensa democrática. El deterioro democrático rara vez se produce de forma aislada: requiere respuestas coordinadas entre la sociedad civil, los medios, la academia y las instituciones. A través del mapeo de actores, la articulación de redes y el desarrollo de mecanismos de coordinación, el Garage contribuye a construir ecosistemas estructurados capaces de acción colectiva. Este eje culmina en el Encuentro Regional de Sinergias en agosto de 2026, donde las organizaciones presentarán su visión de plataforma y sentarán las bases para la coordinación regional.

Diagram of Democracy Action Lab's Democracy Garage accelerator methodology, showing three mutually reinforcing tracks — Advisory, Training, and Platform Building — leading to a Regional Synergy Meeting and stronger democratic ecosystems.


Metodología de aceleración de DAL (haga clic para ampliar)

Ocho Organizaciones. Tres Países. Una Región.


Tras un riguroso proceso de selección, The Democracy Garage se enorgullece en dar la bienvenida a las siguientes organizaciones participantes:

CESJUL — Centro de Estudios Socio Jurídicos Latinoamericanos (Colombia)  

Trabaja en la intersección del derecho penal, los derechos humanos y la gobernanza democrática, aportando análisis jurídico riguroso a los desafíos más urgentes de la democracia colombiana — incluyendo el uso del derecho tanto como herramienta de represión como vehículo de rendición de cuentas.

Dejusticia (Colombia)

Una de las organizaciones de derechos humanos más respetadas de América Latina — un auténtico think-and-do tank que combina investigación jurídica rigurosa con litigio estratégico, incidencia directa y formación de capacidades en antidiscriminación, justicia transicional y protección del espacio cívico.

Instituto Sou da Paz (Brazil)

Referente en política de seguridad pública en Brasil durante 25 años, influyendo en la legislación nacional sobre regulación de armas y reducción de homicidios mediante un enfoque basado en evidencia que centra a las comunidades más afectadas por la violencia, en particular la población negra brasileña.

Pacto pela Democracia (Brazil)

La principal coalición pro-democracia de Brasil, integrada por más de 200 organizaciones y reconocida internacionalmente como modelo de defensa democrática colectiva. Su protección coordinada de las elecciones de 2022 — más de 80 acciones entre 35 organizaciones — demostró el poder de construir coaliciones antes de que llegue la crisis.

Instituto de Estudios Peruanos (IEP) (Perú)

Una de las instituciones de ciencias sociales más antiguas y distinguidas de América Latina, el IEP ha construido durante seis décadas la base empírica del análisis democrático en el Perú — desde encuestas de opinión pública y estudios electorales hasta investigación interdisciplinaria sobre poder, desigualdad y el Estado.

Recambio (Perú)

En un país que ha tenido ocho presidentes en una década, Recambio reconstruye la cultura democrática desde dentro del sistema político — con una red de más de 500 egresados de 28 partidos políticos, diálogo interpartidario y la iniciativa 'Voces Contra la Polarización'.

Espacio Crítico (Regional, LAC)

Una organización regional que brinda apoyo estratégico personalizado, formación técnica y asesoría en seguridad a organizaciones de la sociedad civil, periodistas independientes y líderes políticos en la primera línea del retroceso democrático en América Latina y el Caribe.

D-Hub (Regional, Global)

Una comunidad global de defensores de la democracia que conecta a activistas de primera línea y organizaciones de la sociedad civil con expertos que han enfrentado desafíos similares — construyendo la infraestructura para la solidaridad democrática transfronteriza que ninguna organización puede sostener sola.

Un Hito Histórico


The Democracy Garage es el primer programa acelerador de este tipo diseñado específicamente para defensores de la democracia en América Latina y el Caribe. Al combinar el rigor de la investigación basada en evidencia, la agilidad de un modelo acelerador y la profundidad de una alianza a largo plazo, DAL está abriendo un camino inédito para fortalecer la resiliencia democrática — basado en la convicción de que las organizaciones más cercanas a la crisis están mejor posicionadas para afrontarla, cuando se les proporcionan las herramientas, el conocimiento y las conexiones adecuadas.

“Nos enorgullece inmensamente lanzar The Democracy Garage junto a estas ocho organizaciones extraordinarias," afirmó Beatriz Magaloni, codirectora del DAL y Graham H. Stuart Professor of International Relations en el Departamento de Ciencia Política. "Cada una de ellas representa lo que es la defensa de la democracia en la práctica, no en la teoría. Juntos, estamos comprometidos con algo sin precedentes: construir una comunidad de estrategia y solidaridad que fortalezca la democracia, país por país.”
 

Sobre el Democracy Action Lab

El Democracy Action Lab (DAL) es una iniciativa de investigación y estrategia con sede en el Center on Democracy, Development and Rule of Law de la Universidad de Stanford, dedicada a traducir las ciencias sociales en herramientas prácticas para quienes defienden la democracia. El DAL trabaja en la intersección entre la evidencia y la acción, colaborando con organizaciones de primera línea para fortalecer las instituciones democráticas, proteger el espacio cívico y contrarrestar las amenazas autoritarias en América Latina y más allá.

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Political scientists emphasize need for pro-democracy coalitions at launch of Democracy Action Lab

Political science scholars discussed strengthening pro-democracy coalitions in a Wednesday event marking the launch of CDDRL’s new Democracy Action Lab.
Political scientists emphasize need for pro-democracy coalitions at launch of Democracy Action Lab
Prof. Adam Prezworski, Prof. Beatriz Magaloni, and Prof. Alberto Díaz Cayeros present during DAL’s Inaugural Conference at El Colegio de Mexico.
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Stanford’s Democracy Action Lab Launches in Mexico City

The new initiative from the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law connects research with frontline efforts to address democratic backsliding across Latin America.
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Illustration of diverse young activists emerging from a garage carrying books and a raised-fist flag, with a network of connected stars overhead, symbolizing the Democracy Garage.
Pariplab Chakraborty
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El Primer Acelerador de Democracia de Este Tipo en América Latina y el Caribe.

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In Brief
  • El Laboratorio de Democracia en Acción (DAL, por sus siglas en inglés) del CDDRL lanzó el primer acelerador de democracia de América Latina, el Democracy Garage (Garaje de la Democracia).
  • El programa combina la capacidad de investigación y la experiencia docente del DAL con ocho organizaciones de Colombia, Brasil y Perú.
  • Beatriz Magaloni, codirectora del DAL, calificó la iniciativa como una comunidad de estrategia y solidaridad sin precedentes, impulsada por Stanford.
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Democracy Action Lab Launches First Cohort of the Democracy Garage

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Héctor Fuentes
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The Democracy Action Lab (DAL), a practitioner-centered initiative of the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law at Stanford University, is proud to officially announce the first cohort of its Democracy Garage, the first accelerator program of its kind dedicated to strengthening frontline democracy defenders across Latin America and the Caribbean.

The Democracy Garage was born from a simple but urgent conviction: democratic resilience is built not only through ideas, but through the capacity of organizations to act strategically, use evidence effectively, communicate persuasively, and adapt to rapidly evolving political environments. DAL built this program to close a persistent gap in democracy support, bridging high-level research with the real-time, operational needs of the organizations doing the hardest work on the ground.

Over the next few months, DAL will work side by side with eight extraordinary organizations across the region, applying a structured accelerator methodology to co-develop strategies tailored to the specific democratic challenges in each country. This is not a traditional growth program: it is a deep collaboration grounded in evidence, strategy, and solidarity.

A Three-Track Accelerator Model


The accelerator model of the Democracy Garage is organized around three mutually reinforcing tracks designed to address a key gap in the democracy support ecosystem: many programs either provide high-level training disconnected from immediate needs or short-term technical assistance that does not build lasting capacity. The Garage bridges this divide.

Track 1  |  Evidence Analysis for Democratic Strategizing  —  Hands-On Advisory

The first track provides direct, problem-driven advisory support. Each of the selected organizations enters the Garage with a defined, real-time challenge. DAL mobilizes its analytical capacity, including faculty expertise, student engagement, and data tools, to help address it collaboratively. This is not one-directional technical assistance: it is a joint process that builds organizations' own capacity to use evidence as a strategic tool, shifting from reactive to anticipatory modes of operation.

Track 2  |  Training and Capacity Building  —  Four Core Areas

The second track offers structured training in four areas critical to democratic action: (1) Strategizing for democratic defense — understanding the state of democracy in the region and its main challenges; (2) AI for activism — practical applications of artificial intelligence for monitoring, communication, and decision-making; (3) Evidence for democratic defense — data collection, analysis, and interpretation linked directly to strategic decisions; and (4) Storytelling for change — translating complex analysis into compelling narratives that resonate with policymakers, media, and citizens alike.

Track 3  |  Platform Building for Democratic Defense  —  Scaling for Systemic Impact

The third track supports participating organizations in becoming foundational nodes of country-level democratic defense platforms. Democratic erosion rarely unfolds in isolation: it requires coordinated responses across civil society, media, academia, and institutions. Through actor mapping, network articulation, and the development of coordination mechanisms, the Garage helps build structured ecosystems capable of collective action. This track culminates at the Regional Synergy Meeting in August 2026, where organizations will present their platform visions and lay the groundwork for regional coordination.

Diagram of Democracy Action Lab's Democracy Garage accelerator methodology, showing three mutually reinforcing tracks — Advisory, Training, and Platform Building — leading to a Regional Synergy Meeting and stronger democratic ecosystems.


DAL's Accelerator Methodology (click to enlarge)

Eight Organizations. Three Countries. One Region.


After a rigorous selection process, The Democracy Garage is proud to welcome the following participating organizations:

CESJUL — Centro de Estudios Socio Jurídicos Latinoamericanos (Colombia)  

Works at the intersection of criminal law, human rights, and democratic governance, bringing rigorous legal analysis to the most pressing challenges in Colombian democracy — including the use of law as both a tool of repression and a vehicle for accountability.

Dejusticia (Colombia)

One of Latin America's most respected human rights organizations — a true think-and-do tank combining rigorous legal research with strategic litigation, direct advocacy, and capacity-building across anti-discrimination, transitional justice, and the protection of civic space.

Instituto Sou da Paz (Brazil)

A 25-year leader in public security policy in Brazil, shaping national legislation on firearms regulation and homicide reduction through an evidence-first approach that centers the communities most affected by violence — particularly Black Brazilians.

Pacto pela Democracia (Brazil)

Brazil's preeminent pro-democracy coalition of more than 200 organizations, and an internationally recognized model for coalition-based democratic defense. Its coordinated protection of the 2022 elections — over 80 actions across 35 organizations — demonstrated the power of building coalitions before the crisis arrives.

Instituto de Estudios Peruanos (IEP) (Perú)

One of Latin America's oldest and most distinguished social science institutions, IEP has spent six decades producing the empirical foundation for democratic analysis in Perú — from public opinion surveys and electoral studies to interdisciplinary research on power, inequality, and the state

Recambio (Perú)

In a country that has seen eight presidents in a decade, Recambio is rebuilding democratic culture from within the political system — with a network of over 500 alumni from 28 political parties, cross-partisan dialogue, and the 'Voices Against Polarization' initiative.

Espacio Crítico (Regional, LAC)

A regional organization providing tailored strategic support, technical training, and security advice to civil society organizations, independent journalists, and political leaders on the front lines of democratic backsliding across Latin America and the Caribbean.

D-Hub (Regional, Global)

A global community of democracy defenders connecting frontline activists and civil society organizations with experts who have faced similar challenges — building the infrastructure for cross-border democratic solidarity that no single organization can sustain alone.

A Historic First


The Democracy Garage is the first accelerator program of this type designed specifically for democracy defenders in Latin America and the Caribbean. By combining the rigor of evidence-based research, the agility of an accelerator model, and the depth of long-term collaboration, DAL is pioneering a new approach to democratic resilience — one grounded in the conviction that the organizations closest to the crisis are best positioned to address it, when equipped with the right tools, knowledge, and connections.

"We are immensely proud to launch the Democracy Garage alongside these eight remarkable organizations," said DAL co-director Beatriz Magaloni, the Graham H. Stuart Professor of International Relations. "Each of them represents what democratic defense looks like in practice, not in theory. Together, we are committed to something unprecedented: building a community of strategy and solidarity that makes democracy stronger, one country at a time."
 

About the Democracy Action Lab

The Democracy Action Lab (DAL) is a research and strategy initiative housed at Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development and Rule of Law, dedicated to translating social science into practical tools for democracy defenders. DAL works at the intersection of evidence and action, partnering with frontline organizations to strengthen democratic institutions, protect civic space, and counter authoritarian threats across Latin America and beyond.

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Illustration of diverse young activists emerging from a garage carrying books and a raised-fist flag, with a network of connected stars overhead, symbolizing the Democracy Garage.
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The first democracy accelerator of its kind in Latin America and the Caribbean.

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  • CDDRL’s Democracy Action Lab (DAL) has launched Latin America's first democracy accelerator, the Democracy Garage.
  • The program pairs DAL’s research capacity and faculty expertise with eight organizations across Colombia, Brazil, and Perú.
  • DAL co-director Beatriz Magaloni called the initiative an unprecedented Stanford-led community of strategy and solidarity.
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Rebel party stigmatization: measuring the political price of a rebel past

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The long-term electoral viability of rebel parties depends, in part, on acceptance of them as legitimate political actors. Yet civilians often punish perpetrators of past violence at the ballot box and conflict generates long-term antipathies that can impede democratic integration of former rebels. This paper offers a theoretical conceptualization of rebel party stigmatization and uses an experimental approach in Colombia, informed by interviews on the ground, to clarify the conditions under which stigmatization can be a relevant barrier for rebel parties. First, in semi-structured interviews, rebel party leaders and members uniformly claim that civilian stigmatization of the party is pervasive. Second, we design an endorsement experiment to measure rebel party stigmatization, whether the penalty is distinct from assessments based on ideology or platform, and for whom stigma is strongest. Civilians penalize policies and statements endorsed by the rebel party even when compared to endorsement by ideologically similar parties, indicative of stigmatization. Such rebel party stigmatization is especially strong among two types of citizens. First, citizens who otherwise share a similar ideology with the rebel party but rejected violence are the most stigmatizing, due to a political victimization effect. Second, citizens who did not live in communities with substantial FARC governance and presence are more stigmatizing—those who lived in rebelocracies do not penalize rebel parties but also do not support them strongly.

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Journal of Peace Research
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María Ignacia Curiel
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Spotlight on the 2026 Summer Fellows

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Nora Sulots
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This summer, the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) welcomed 26 democracy leaders from 19 countries across the developing world to its Fisher Family Summer Fellows on Democracy and Development Program for an intensive three-week training focused on democracy, good governance, and rule of law reform. Chosen from a highly competitive applicant pool, the fellows represent a diverse range of professional backgrounds and geographical regions, spanning civil society, public service, social enterprise, media, and technology. Launched in 2005, the program was previously known as the Draper Hills Summer Fellows Program. It was renamed in 2023 in recognition of a gift from the Fisher family — Sakurako (Sako), ‘82, and William (Bill), MBA ‘84 — that endowed the program and secured its future.

Fellows were instructed by a leading Stanford faculty team composed of CDDRL Mosbacher Director and FSI Satre Family Senior Fellow Kathryn Stoner; Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow Francis Fukuyama; Senior Fellow in Global Democracy Larry Diamond; Michael McFaul, FSI Senior Fellow, Ken Olivier and Angela Nomellini Professor of International Studies, and former U.S. Ambassador to Russia; and Erik Jensen, Lecturer in Law at Stanford Law School, on new institutional models and frameworks to enhance their ability to promote good governance, accountable politics, and find new ways to achieve economic development in their home countries.

The program opened with foundational sessions on the dimensions of development, the meaning of democracy, and the role of rule of law, led by faculty including Fukuyama, Diamond, Stoner, and Jensen. Fellows then explored comparative case studies in autocratic governance — from the Middle East to China's global information ecosystem — alongside a fireside discussion on the geopolitics of energy. The second week turned to questions of migration, gender and political development, and the causes of democratization, including a session with the Human Rights Foundation on global patterns of authoritarianism. Additional sessions covered conflict and leadership, transitional justice, and anti-corruption reform, closing with discussions of sharp power, deliberative democracy, and propaganda in autocratic states. In its third and final week, the program addressed some of today's most consequential global issues, including the future of NATO, the geopolitics of artificial intelligence, and democratic backsliding worldwide. The week also covered inequality in Latin America, political corruption, and the challenges facing American democracy ahead of the midterm elections, concluding with sessions on protecting vulnerable populations in conflict and the relationship between land power and democracy.

This year's cohort now joins a global network of more than 500 alumni from over 100 countries, whose professional backgrounds are as diverse as the challenges they confront in their home countries — reflecting a shared dedication to building sound structures of democracy and development.

During the program, the fellows delivered "TED"-style talks in our Fellow Spotlight Series, sharing personal stories about the struggles in their home countries, stories of their fight for justice, equality, and democracy, and stories of optimism and endurance. You can watch their talks in the playlist below:

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2026 Fisher Family Summer Fellows
Rod Searcey
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The Fellow Spotlight Series is an inspiring and moving series of "TED"-style talks given by each of our 2026 Fisher Family Summer Fellows to share their backstories and discuss their work.

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2026 Shorenstein Journalism Award: Shibani Mahtani on Attacks Against the Free Press and Democratic Backsliding in Southeast Asia 

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Flyer for the 2026 Shorenstein Jouranlism Award. Abstract red background with geometric pattern and headshots of award winner Shibani Mahtani and panelists Anna Fifield, Oren Samet, and James Hamilton.

“What’s Your Agenda?”: Attacks Against the Free Press and Democratic Backsliding in Southeast Asia

 

The 2026 Shorenstein Journalism Award Honors Singapore-Based Investigative Journalist Shibani Mahtani


In her 15 years reporting on Southeast Asia and Hong Kong, Shibani Mahtani has witnessed the region’s once-vibrant press corps dwindle in size, as journalists are jailed, harassed, and sued by governments. This pressure, along with an industry-wide strain on the business of journalism, has forced many outlets to shutter. In her keynote address, she will discuss how this diminished media environment has had a profound impact on regional democracy at a time of seismic global instability and consider the challenges of navigating this reality.

Join APARC as we recognize Mahtani, winner of the 2026 Shorenstein Journalism Award, for her exemplary reporting that has brought critical attention to the erosion of democracy and human rights across Asia, particularly in Southeast Asia.

Mahtani's keynote will be followed by a conversation with two experts: Anna Fifield, a New Zealand journalist, foreign affairs analyst, and winner of the 2018 Shorenstein Journalism Award, and Oren Samet, assistant professor of political science at Rice University. The event will conclude with an audience Q&A session.

Panel Chair: James Hamilton, vice provost for undergraduate education, Hearst Professor of Communication, and director of the Stanford Journalism Program.

 

 

Speakers   
 

Portrait of Shibani Mahtani.

Shibani Mahtani a Singapore-based investigative journalist. Until February 2026, she was an international investigative correspondent for the Washington Post. She focuses on accountability-driven investigations across the Asia-Pacific region. She joined The Post's foreign desk in 2018 as the Southeast Asia and Hong Kong Bureau Chief, and was honored with awards including a Human Rights Press Award for her reporting on the 2019 Hong Kong protests. Prior to joining The Post, Shibani was a correspondent for the Wall Street Journal based in Singapore, Myanmar, and Chicago. She is an author of Among the Braves, a narrative non-fiction history of Hong Kong's pro-democracy movement.

Portrait of Anna Fifield.

Anna Fifield, a New Zealand journalist and foreign affairs analyst, writes a newsletter on New Zealand’s role in global affairs. She is also a non-resident fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, contributing to their work on New Zealand geopolitics and the U.S.-New Zealand partnership. She spent more than 20 years as a foreign correspondent for the Washington Post and Financial Times, reporting from Asia, the Middle East, and the United States, and later served as the Washington Post’s Asia-Pacific editor, overseeing coverage of China and the wider region. From 2020 to 2022, she was editor of the Dominion Post in Wellington, New Zealand’s capital city. Fifield was a Nieman Journalism Fellow at Harvard University, where she studied political change in closed societies, and won Stanford University’s 2018 Shorenstein Journalism Award for excellence in reporting on Asia. Her book on North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, The Great Successor, has been translated into 24 languages.

Fifield serves on the Shorenstein Journalism Award judging committee.

Portrait of Oren Samet.

Oren Samet is an assistant professor of political science at Rice University. His research centers on the international dimensions of authoritarian politics and democratization, with a particular emphasis on how opposition actors engage both at home and abroad. Bridging international relations and comparative politics, his work explores the dynamics of autocratization, how opposition parties compete in unfair elections, and how non-state actors shape foreign policy across borders. Further research examines innovations to confront democratic backsliding and the challenges of external support for democratic governance. Samet’s research draws on extensive fieldwork in Southeast Asia, his primary regional focus, complemented by analysis spanning a broad range of autocratic and backsliding contexts. His academic work has been published in the American Journal of Political Science, Comparative Political Studies, and Political Communication, and his other writing has been published in outlets including Foreign Policy, Slate, and World Politics Review. Before entering academia, Samet was based in Bangkok, Thailand, and worked on democracy and human rights initiatives across Southeast Asia, engaging with politicians and civil society. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and was previously a Postdoctoral Fellow at Stanford's Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law.

Panel Chair
 

James Hamilton

James Hamilton is the Freeman-Thornton Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education, Hearst Professor of Communication, and director of the Stanford Journalism Program. His most recent book is You Got In! Now What? 100 Insights into Finding Your Best Life in College (Radius Book Group, 2025). His books on media markets and information provision include All the News That’s Fit to Sell: How the Market Transforms Information into News (Princeton, 2004), Regulation Through Revelation: The Origin, Politics, and Impacts of the Toxics Release Inventory Program (Cambridge, 2005), and Channeling Violence: The Economic Market for Violent Television Programming (Princeton, 1998). His book Democracy's Detectives: The Economics of Investigative Journalism (Harvard, 2016) focuses on the market for investigative reporting. Through research in the field of computational journalism, he is exploring how the costs of story discovery can be lowered through better use of data and algorithms. He is co-founder of the Stanford Computational Journalism Lab, Senior Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, affiliated faculty at the Brown Institute for Media Innovation, and member of the JSK Fellowships Board of Visitors.

Hamilton serves on the Shorenstein Journalism Award judging committee.

James Hamilton

 

Bechtel Conference Center
Encina Hall Central (First Floor)
616 Jane Stanford Way, Stanford, CA 94305

Shibani Mahtani
Anna Fifield
Oren Samet
Panel Discussions
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Chris Dann

Encina Hall, E109
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

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CDDRL Predoctoral Fellow, 2026-27
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Chris Dann is a PhD candidate in Political Science at Stanford University and is a current pre-doctoral fellow with the Center for Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL). Before graduate school, he received a BSc from the London School of Economics and an MSc at the University of Oxford. He then returned to LSE for two years as a pre-doctoral fellow, working for economist Professor Sir Tim Besley. His research interests lie in the political economy of large-scale infrastructure investments and how these shape the social contract. 

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Frances Cayton

Encina Hall, E106
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

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Einstein Moos Postdoctoral Fellow, 2026-27
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Frances Cayton is a scholar of democracy and civil society. For the 2026-27 academic year, she is the Einstein Moos Postdoctoral Fellow at Stanford's Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL). In 2027, she will join the University of South Carolina as an Assistant Professor of Political Science.

Frances' book project, "How Civic Consciousness Shapes Democratic Resilience," examines how, why, and under what conditions civil society encourages individuals to depolarize and resist democratic erosion. Combining extensive organizational and bureaucratic data, elite and mass surveys, experiments, and interview evidence, she demonstrates how informal and apolitical subsets of civic life retain critical latent democratic potential. The project primarily focuses on Poland and Hungary, though it also draws comparisons with cases across East-Central Europe and globally.

More broadly, Frances works on questions about the drivers and consequences of democratic engagement, particularly concerning conspiracy theories, opposition media, and the challenges of post-backsliding redemocratization. Her research is published or forthcoming in numerous outlets, including the American Journal of Political Science and Perspectives on Politics. Her work has been supported by the US Departments of State and Education, as well as the American Political Science Association. She is also the co-founder of EEPGW, a monthly online workshop on East European politics.

Frances holds a Ph.D. in Government from Cornell University. She earned her AM from Harvard University's Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies and a BA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

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