Authoritarian resurgence

In a world marked by chains of crises (economic, health, climate and geopolitical), authoritarianism is resurging strongly, adapting to the times to legitimise itself before exhausted societies. It no longer appears only in uniforms and iron rhetoric, but wrapped in technocratic language, promises of efficiency and the narrative of restoring “order” in the face of supposedly uncontrollable chaos. Leaders on different continents take advantage of the wear on democratic institutions and public disaffection to concentrate power, curtail freedoms and weaken checks and balances, arguing that only a strong authority can guarantee stability.

The separation of powers is eroded, critical voices are silenced and mass surveillance is normalised, presenting the restriction of rights as a necessary sacrifice for the collective good.

The offensive is not limited to politics: it also reaches science, culture and critical thinking, fields that authoritarian regimes see as threats to their control of the narrative. Evidence and informed debate are replaced by propaganda, selective censorship and attacks on those who question the official line. This hostility towards independent knowledge seeks to neutralise any resistance that might mobilise citizens.

In this context, the line between weakened democracy and consolidated authoritarianism becomes blurred. What was once seen as an exceptional drift is now part of global political normality. The “authoritarian resurgence” is not just the return of old formulas of control, but their reinvention for a hyperconnected 21st century that is, paradoxically, ever more disconnected from the democratic values it claims to defend.