How the biggest election year in history might play out

Votes in world's biggest democracies, as well as its most 'despotic' and 'stressed' countries, face threats of violence and suppression

Voters in queue polling station, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
About half the world's population are eligible to vote in elections in more than 60 countries in 2024
(Image credit: Dinodia Photo/Getty)

Elections are "no guarantee of democracy", but "it's also true that democracy does not exist without elections".

So said Time magazine talking about 2024, a year dubbed "the Year of Democracy", when half the world's population are eligible to vote in elections across more than 60 countries. About 4.2 billion people representing 42% of the world's GDP have a chance to elect new leaders, according to estimates by Bloomberg Economics – "a busy lineup even in calmer political times". 

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Harriet Marsden is a writer for The Week, mostly covering UK and global news and politics. Before joining the site, she was a freelance journalist for seven years, specialising in social affairs, gender equality and culture. She worked for The Guardian, The Times and The Independent, and regularly contributed articles to The Sunday Times, The Telegraph, The New Statesman, Tortoise Media and Metro, as well as appearing on BBC Radio London, Times Radio and “Woman’s Hour”. She has a master’s in international journalism from City University, London, and was awarded the "journalist-at-large" fellowship by the Local Trust charity in 2021.