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On 26 August 2025, International IDEA, in partnership with the Electoral Tribunal of Panama, hosted a one-day Technical and Advisory Support Event in Panama City as part of the Protecting Elections project, funded by the Government of Canada. The event was the third under the Protecting Elections umbrella in Panama and brought together more than 30 participants, including representatives from the Tribunal, the Electoral Prosecutor General's Office, other key state agencies, academia and civil society organizations. The discussions centered on identifying and mitigating risks of fraud and corruption, with special attention to political and campaign financing.

Over the past decade, information integrity has emerged as a cornerstone of healthy democracies, underpinning public trust, accountable governance and meaningful citizen participation. As digital spaces have become increasingly polluted by disinformation and fake content, exacerbated by the rapid rise of generative artificial intelligence, societies face growing challenges in distinguishing fact from fiction.

This global methodology provides a structured, in-depth framework for analysing the enablers and incentives behind election-related foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI). Developed with and for civil society actors, it is designed to support context-specific research, strengthen analytical capacity and inform practical responses to FIMI threats that undermine democratic processes.

The  Global Election Monitor (GEM) is the first interactive platform that provides an overview of 54 national elections during the 2024 elections super-cycle year and corresponding electoral integrity challenges and innovations in election administration. The GEM was launched on 31 March 2025 and is available on International IDEA website as a global public good.  

The International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA) will convene a two-day Dialogue for Male Engagement on Gender Equality and Transformative Social Norms from 20th to 21st August 2025 in Nairobi, Kenya.

In an era marked by rapid technological advancements, geopolitical shifts, and pressing global challenges, the role of education in shaping democratic societies has never been more critical.

This is the fourth and final episode in a podcast series featuring LEGITIMULT a project that examines how measures taken during the Covid-19 crisis by international, national, and subnational governments have affected multilevel institutions and intergovernmental relations.The aim of the research is to develop a model of legitimate crisis governance. 

Deliberative methods are increasingly a source of inspiration for those who seek to redress the global trend of deepening dissatisfaction in democracy. Such methods offer parliaments the opportunity to engage citizens in rigorous in-depth consideration of complex policy problems and through this potentially enhance their own deliberations and democratic wellbeing overall.

Citizen engagement processes in democracies are regularly criticized for only involving ‘the usual suspects’: people from broadly similar, usually socio-economically advantaged, backgrounds. This means parliaments are less likely to make decisions, policies and legislation that respond to the needs and interests of the wider population, and more likely to be seen as elite institutions.

Parliaments are fundamental to democracy, but it is often difficult to understand how they work. Parliaments have a responsibility to provide opportunities for citizens across different groups in society to learn about what their parliament is, what it does, and how to get involved.

Incluir a los jóvenes en la toma de decisiones participativa, un elemento vital de la democracia, es esencial para alcanzar el desarrollo sostenible, la Agenda 2030 y los compromisos del Pacto para el Futuro.

Including youth in participatory decision-making, a vital element of democracy, is essential for reaching sustainable development, the 2030 Agenda, and the commitments in the Pact for the Future.

Parliaments are both spaces and places. As spaces, they are collections of rooms, halls, offices and grounds that are used for particular purposes. As places, they mean something to the people they represent – but they don’t mean the same thing, or as much, to everyone, and increasingly people hold negative feelings towards parliaments.

In November, the Brazilian city of Belém will become the site for COP30, making it the first time in several years that the UNFCCC climate summit takes place in a democratic country.

In many parts of the world, Indigenous Peoples maintain a profound relationship with their lands—a connection that often has deeply political, social, cultural, spiritual, and religious dimensions. Yet all too often this relationship is undermined (or even disregarded) by legal and political systems that fail to recognize Indigenous rights.

Indigenous Peoples are recognized in United Nations documentation as distinct communities with ancestral ties to specific territories, possessing unique ethnic identities, cultural traditions, social structures, traditional governance practices, and legal systems. As emphasized by the International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA), achieving genuine empowerment, equality, and secure access to land and natural resources for Indigenous Peoples requires robust protection of their political rights within national legal frameworks and governance systems.

Public consultation is essential to ensuring that parliaments’ decisions meet the needs of the societies they represent. In democracies, citizens have the right to a say on decisions that affect them. On a more instrumental level, citizens are also a vital source of information that can help to guide legislation and policymaking to better outcomes.

The year 2024 has been described as a super-cycle election year, with 1.6 billion people voting in 74 national elections in 62 countries due to a convergence in national electoral calendars.

El reciente informe de IDEA Internacional, "Financiamiento Político en la Era Digital: Hacia una Reforma Basada en la Evidencia",

International IDEA’s recent report “Political Finance in the Digital Age: Towards Evidence-Based Reform” warns that while online political campaign is exploding in scale and complexity, regulatory frameworks remain outdated. Drawing on 13 country case studies from across the globe, the report highlights the main challenges and identifies best practices and possible solutions.