When Democracy Dies

Navalny's Warning to the West

Yesterday marked one year since Alexei Navalny died in an Arctic prison colony, murdered by the regime he dared to challenge. His death at 47 – a state killing in all but name – was Putin's brutal message to anyone who would stand against Russia's "murderous personalist autocracy," as one analyst put it.

But Navalny's story is not just about Russia. It carries urgent lessons for all who care about democracy's future. At a moment when authoritarian forces are ascendant globally, when Donald Trump's return threatens the democratic alliance, and when even established democracies show signs of decay, Navalny's courage and clarity of purpose light the way forward.

Consider what Navalny fought against: a system where one man's power faces no real constraints, where oligarchs loot the state while critics are poisoned or jailed, where elections are a cynical fiction and truth itself is whatever the regime declares. Putin's Russia shows us what happens when democracy's guardrails are systematically dismantled. The Russian people are not willing participants in this tragedy but its primary victims, their voices silenced by a vast machinery of repression and propaganda.

Now look westward. Trump's second presidency has begun with ominous echoes of authoritarian practice: purging the civil service of "disloyal" elements, weaponising the Justice Department against opponents, praise for dictators coupled with disdain for democratic allies, even an open announcement of plans that amount to ethnic cleansing. His first two weeks saw a flurry of executive orders that, as The Atlantic notes, appear designed to usurp legislative authority while Congress stands "stunned." Most alarming, nearly half of Republican voters now say they want a president unconstrained by courts or Congress – the very definition of authoritarian rule.

This matters enormously because democracy's true value lies in its safeguards against abuse of power. When functioning properly, democratic systems prevent catastrophic mistakes through checks and balances, protect individual rights through independent courts, and enable peaceful correction of errors through free elections. The twin democratic guardians of free media and responsive government make serious failures impossible to hide and impossible to ignore.

But these benefits are easy to take for granted until they're gone. Turkey's descent from flawed democracy to de facto dictatorship under Erdoğan, or Hungary's transformation into what its own leader proudly calls an "illiberal state," show how democratic institutions can be hollowed out from within while maintaining a facade of electoral legitimacy. Often the process is gradual – restrictions on media freedom here, attacks on judicial independence there – until one day citizens wake up to find their democracy has rotted away beyond recognition.

This is why Navalny's example matters so much. Despite assassination attempts, prison, and ultimately death, he persisted in exposing corruption, speaking truth to power, and showing Russians that a better future was possible. His famous instruction – "Don't give up" – when asked what people should do if he was killed, exemplifies the tenacity democracy requires of its defenders.

We in Britain face nothing like the dangers Navalny confronted. But we do face serious democratic decay that demands attention and action. Our voting system produces Parliament's that badly misrepresent the electorate (in 2024, Labour won 63% of seats from just 34% of votes). Dark money flows through our politics via legal loopholes, while waves of disinformation pollute public debate. Trust in democratic institutions has fallen to historic lows.

This is precisely why Open Britain has developed an ambitious strategy for democratic renewal over the next four years. We're not claiming equivalence with Navalny's heroic struggle – that would be grotesque. But we are engaged in the same fundamental fight: ensuring that power flows from citizens and remains accountable to them.

Our plan tackles democracy's weaknesses systematically: replacing our broken voting system with proportional representation, eliminating dark money from politics, countering disinformation, and pushing back against authoritarian populism wherever it appears. With a powerful group of cross-party parliamentarians inside Parliament and a growing movement of determined activists outside, we are building an irresistible demand for change.

The strategy is ambitious but achievable. For the first time, a majority of political parties (with a combined membership of 500 seats) agree that first-past-the-post damages trust in politics. Public support for proportional representation has reached historic highs. Three quarters of citizens want fundamental reform of political funding. The appetite for democratic renewal is real.

What's needed now is the persistence Navalny exemplified. Democracy's enemies play the long game, gradually eroding norms and institutions until they break. Its defenders must be equally patient and determined. We must build resilient democratic institutions that can withstand future storms.

Navalny often recalled that old saying: "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing." He chose to do something, and paid the ultimate price. While we face nothing like his risks, we do share a clear duty: to strengthen our democracy while we still can, to fix what's broken before it disappears completely.

This is not about party politics. It's about ensuring that our children inherit a system where their voices matter, where power answers to the people, where truth can prevail over lies. It's about building democratic institutions strong enough to resist tomorrow's authoritarians.

A year after his death, Navalny's courage still lights the way. The best tribute we can pay him is to defend democracy with the same clarity of purpose, if thankfully not the same level of sacrifice. The task is urgent but not hopeless. As Navalny himself said in one of his final messages: "We have more power than we think. Don't lose heart, and don't let them take away your hope for change."