Citizens’ vigilance key to resilient democracy

Political analysts urged citizens to remain vigilant all the time, not only in holding their own governments to account, but also in questioning the global systems that help shape crises in developing nations.

They underscored the need for unfettered media, greater political participation of women, and a determined effort to narrow all forms of inequality as foundations of a resilient democracy.

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"The first and foremost thing that we need to do as a citizen -- wherever we are -- is basically vigilance because the price of democracy is eternal vigilance," said Prof Ali Riaz, special assistant to the chief adviser.

He was speaking at a panel discussion titled "Fragility as the New Normal: States in Permanent Emergency", at the Bay of Bengal Conversation, a three-day international event organised by the Centre for Governance Studies at a city hotel yesterday.

States often remain vulnerable to external shocks, he said. Although the global centre of gravity has shifted from the Atlantic to the Pacific with the rise of China and other East Asian economies, the "calculus" of the global economic order remains unchanged, according to him.

"The global economy's calculus produces a certain structure within which countries, particularly those of the Global South, have to reside and operate, and that crisis is an external economic one," said Riaz, a distinguished professor of politics and government at Illinois State University.

Citing the recent popular uprisings in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal, he said all three countries have been deeply integrated into neoliberal economic systems that, in turn, generated enormous disparities that fuelled the unrest.

"Here, the state is a participant, but not necessarily in the driver's seat," he said.

Riaz added that climate change caused by the Global North has compounded vulnerabilities in developing countries. At the same time, technology is increasingly deployed as a surveillance tool in smaller states. When these global pressures converge with domestic inequalities, crises emerge.

Citizens, therefore, must continually scrutinise state actions and examine whether government decisions are rational, Riaz said. The gulf between elites and ordinary people also demands urgent attention.

At the discussion, Democracy International Chief of Party Catherine Cecil said strong civic and political engagement at the local level is crucial for democratic resilience.

She identified three essential components for successful democratic resilience. These are active youth engagement, cooperation across political parties, and efforts to combat abuse and harassment, especially targeting women, in digital spaces.

Youth make up about a quarter of Bangladesh's population, she noted, and have historically played decisive roles in toppling governments and have huge potential in rebuilding communities.

Engaging them, she said, improves representation and cultivates the next generation of leaders.

On cross-party cooperation, Cecil said that despite intraparty violence, political parties remain well placed to foster peaceful political participation and strengthen community ties. She cited examples of multi-party collaboration and prevention of violence against minorities in parts of Bangladesh.

Cecil raised concerns about targeted abuse against women in politics. A recent study showed that 76 percent of women MPs in the Asia-Pacific region reported online psychological gender-based violence.

Likewise, she said, although women played leading roles in the 2024 July uprising, female activists in Bangladesh now face coordinated smear campaigns -- a trend that threatens representation and quality of democracy.

"Unfortunately, there's no agreement on one effective solution, but it's clear that we need a multi-prong approach, including legal measures and media interventions such as factchecking and increased accountability," she said.

Nurul Kabir, editor of the New Age, said disinformation existed in the past, but technology has amplified its reach to an unprecedented scale, making fact-checking even more challenging for the media.

There are suggestions that newsrooms employ dedicated fact-checkers, he said, but ultimately, "every professional journalist should be a fact-checker", he added.

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The Daily Star | November 24, 2025