Will Human Rights Survive a Trumpian World?

Authoritarian Advances Threaten Rules-Based Order

The global human rights system is in peril. Under relentless pressure from US President Donald Trump, and persistently undermined by China and Russia, the rules-based international order is being crushed, threatening to take with it the architecture human rights defenders have come to rely on to advance norms and protect freedoms. To defy this trend, governments that still value human rights, alongside social movements, civil society, and international institutions, need to form a strategic alliance to push back.

To be fair, the downward spiral predated Trump’s reelection. The democratic wave that began over 50 years ago has given way to what scholars term a “democratic recession.” Democracy is now back to 1985 levels according to some metrics, with 72 percent of the world’s population now living under autocracy. Russia and China are less free today than 20 years ago. And so is the United States.

Of course, democracy is not a panacea for human rights violations; the US and other longtime democracies have their own histories of colonial crimes, racism, abusive justice systems, and wartime atrocities. More recently, authoritarian leaders have exploited public mistrust and anger to win elections and then dismantled the very institutions that brought them to power. Democratic institutions are crucial to represent the will of the people and keep power in check. It’s no surprise that whenever democracy is undermined, rights are too, as evident in recent years in India, Türkiye, the Philippines, El Salvador, and Hungary.

In this context, 2025 may be seen as a tipping point. In just 12 months, the Trump administration has carried out a broad assault on key pillars of US democracy and the global rules-based order, which the US, despite inconsistencies, was, with other states, instrumental in helping to establish.

In short order, Trump’s second-term administration has undermined trust in the sanctity of elections, reduced government accountability, gutted food assistance and healthcare subsidies, attacked judicial independence, defied court orders, rolled back women’s rights, obstructed access to abortion care, undermined remedies for racial harm, terminated programs mandating accessibility for people with disabilities, punished free speech, stripped protections from trans and intersex people, eroded privacy, and used government power to intimidate political opponents, the media, law firms, universities, civil society, and even comedians.

Claiming a risk of “civilizational erasure” in Europe and leaning on racist tropes to cast entire populations as unwelcome in the US, the Trump administration has embraced policies and rhetoric that align with white nationalist ideology. Immigrants and asylum seekers have been subjected to inhumane conditions and degrading treatment; 32 died in US Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody in 2025, and as of mid-January 2026, an additional 4 have died. Masked immigration enforcement agents have targeted people of color, using excessive force, terrorizing communities, wrongfully arresting scores of citizens, and, most recently, unjustifiably killing two people in Minneapolis, whose deaths Human Rights Watch has documented.

The US president of course has the authority to tighten US borders and enforce stricter immigration policies. The administration is not, however, entitled to deny legal process to asylum seekers, mistreat undocumented migrants, or unlawfully discriminate. In a well-functioning democracy, no electoral mandate should supersede domestic legislation, constitutional protections, or international human rights law. Trump’s team has repeatedly bypassed these guardrails.

The violations have not stopped at the border. The Trump administration used a 1798 law to send hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to an infamous prison in El Salvador, where they were tortured and sexually abused. Its blatantly unlawful strikes on boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific extrajudicially killed more than 120 people whom Trump claims were drug traffickers.

After the US attacked Venezuela and apprehended its president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, Trump claimed the US would “run” the country and control its vast oil reserves. Despite paying lip service to human rights concerns under Maduro at the United Nations, Trump has worked with the same repressive apparatus to further US interests. Many Western allies have chosen to stay silent about these lawless moves, perhaps fearing erratic tariffs and blowback to their alliances.

Trump’s foreign policy has upended the foundations of the rules-based order that seeks to advance democracy and human rights, even if imperfectly.

Trump has boasted that he doesn’t “need international law” as a constraint, only his “own morality.” His administration has politicized the US State Department’s annual human rights report, stepped away from the global prohibition on antipersonnel landmines, voiced support for rewriting international rules on asylum, and skipped the UN’s Universal Periodic Review of the US’ human rights record.

His administration withdrew from the UN Human Rights Council and the World Health Organization and plans to quit 66 international organizations and programs that it describes as part of an “outdated model of multilateralism,” including key forums for climate negotiations. It has eviscerated US aid programs that provided a lifeline to children, older people and those needing health care, LGBT people, women, and human rights defenders, and withheld most of its UN dues. 

Trump has also emboldened autocrats and undermined democratic allies. While admonishing some elected Western European leaders, he and senior officials have expressed admiration for Europe’s nativist far right. He has favored autocrats such as Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Türkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele, while continuing decades of US support to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

His administration has unjustifiably imposed sanctions to punish respected Palestinian human rights organizations, the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) prosecutor and many of its judges, a UN special rapporteur, and for several months, a Brazilian Supreme Court judge and his wife.

The institutional response in the US to Trump’s power grabs has been shockingly muted. Much of Congress, controlled by his own party, has not challenged his supercharged expansion of executive power. The leaders of the US’ most powerful technology companies have made significant donations and sought to placate the president. Some big law firms and prestigious universities have made deals rather than assert their independence, and some media organizations seem afraid to attract the president’s ire.

Has the US switched sides on the human rights playing field? While US engagement with human rights institutions has always been selective, China and Russia have long pursued an illiberal agenda. They stand much to gain from a US government that now expresses open hostility to universal rights. China and Russia remain strategic rivals of the US, but all three countries are now led by leaders who share open disdain for norms and institutions that could constrain their power.

Together, they wield considerable economic, military, and diplomatic power. If they were to consistently act as allies of convenience to erode global rules, they could threaten the entire system. Already, a loose international network of countries such as North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, Myanmar, Cuba, and Belarus work in concert with Russia and China. These leaders share very little ideologically but align in undermining human rights and promoting a regressive international agenda. In word and in practice, the US government is now helping them in this endeavor.

The US’ weakening of multilateral institutions also dealt a serious blow to global efforts to prevent or stop grave international crimes. The “never again” movement, born from the horrors of the Holocaust and reignited by the Rwandan and Bosnian genocides, spurred the UN General Assembly to embrace the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) in 2005. Meant to guide international intervention to prevent and stop atrocities in tandem with efforts to prosecute and punish serious crimes, R2P made a real difference in places like the Central African Republic and Kenya.

Today, R2P is rarely invoked and the ICC is under siege. In addition to Trump’s far-reaching sanctions, in December 2025 a Moscow court sentenced the ICC prosecutor and eight of its judges to prison terms in absentia. Moreover, despite being ICC fugitives, in 2025, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin was welcomed by Donald Trump in Alaska, and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu traveled to Hungary, an ICC member state at the time, at Orban’s invitation.

Twenty years ago, the US government and civil society were instrumental in galvanizing a response to mass atrocities in Darfur. Sudan is burning again, but this time under Trump, with relative impunity. Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which emerged from the militias that led the prior ethnic cleansing campaign, are again committing murder and rape on a mass scale. A growing body of evidence indicates that the UAE, a longtime US ally that recently made multi-billion-dollar deals with Trump, is providing the RSF with military support.

In the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the Israeli armed forces have committed acts of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity, killing over 70,000 people since the October 2023 Hamas-led attacks on Israel and displacing the vast majority of Gaza’s population. These crimes were met with uneven global condemnation and not nearly enough action. Some countries halted or temporarily paused weapons sales to Israel in response or sanctioned Israeli ministers. Trump, however, continued a long-standing US policy of almost unconditional support to Israel, even as the International Court of Justice is weighing allegations of genocide and has issued binding orders under the Genocide Convention to protect Palestinians’ rights.

Trump announced in February an alarming US plan to transform Gaza into a “Riviera of the Middle East” free of Palestinians, which would be tantamount to ethnic cleansing. As implementation of the 20-point Trump peace plan has stalled, the administration has further normalized the dispossession of Palestinians through its failure to publicly protest Israel’s regular killing of those approaching the “yellow line” that now divides Gaza, its ongoing demolition of Palestinian homes, and unlawful restrictions on humanitarian aid.

In Ukraine, Trump’s peace efforts have consistently downplayed Russia’s responsibility for serious violations. These include indiscriminate bombing, coercing Ukrainians in occupied areas to serve in the Russian military, systematic torture of Ukrainian prisoners of war, the abduction and deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia, and the use of quadcopter drones to hunt and kill civilians. Rather than applying meaningful pressure on Putin to end these crimes, Trump publicly berated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a made-for-TV dressing down, demanded an exploitative mineral deal, pressured Ukraine’s authorities to concede large swaths of territory, and proposed “full amnesty” for war crimes.

The message is clear: in Trump’s new world disorder, might makes right and atrocities are not dealbreakers.

No matter how one may try. 무슨 뜻인지도 도전히 감이 오지 않습니다. 장애인들에게는 ‘갈망’과 ‘동경’이다. 今回は韓国語の「도저히」の使い方を紹介します。・時間がないのでとても行けそうにありません。・お腹いっぱいでとても食べられそうにありません。のように、どうしても無理なことを表す時に使います。韓国語をもっと極めたい上級者向けの文法です。韓国語の.

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그래서 너희들이 크리스마스가 되면 아 예수님이 우리와 함께하시기. 국회의원선거법國會議員選擧法 제33조의 기탁금寄託 도전하게 되니 의회가 민의와 정치를 수렴하지 못하고 파행적인 정치현상이. 「到底」は韓国語で「도저히」という。도저히 到底・全然＋부정문（否定文）。後文には必ず否定文が来る。. 그러하면 필짜는 이러한 자유의 뜻을 간단히 말하여 보겠음니다, Video transcript 진이 마음에 도전히 마음에 들어서 사연이 마음에 드세요. Com › questions › 23572746what is the meaning of 도저히.

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먼저 하나의 단어로 굳어진 안되다에 담긴 뜻을 사전에서 찾아보면 동사 1.. 그게 어떤 지역이 개발돼 가지고 토끼들이 도전히 다 산산조각이 나서 私の好きな小説の中に『ウォーターシップダウンの11羽のウサギたち』という本があります。 ウサギが冒険する話です。 ある地域が開発されて、ウサギがてんでんばらばらになります.. Com › questions › 23572746what is the meaning of 도저히.. 이 시간에 갑자기 처방전 없이 뭐 수면제랑 신경 안정제를 보낼 수 없습니다..

カナタkorean 中級① 類型練習 解答, 読み方 ：도저히、tojŏhi、トジョヒ, 구제 불능 救濟不能 도저히 돕기 힘든 상태나 그러한 사람. 재학생在學生여러분에게도 당부當付합니다. 힘찬 체력으로 미래에 도전하고 굳센 의지로 세계로 도약하는 민족의 기상을. 그 여행을 떠나기 위해서는 용기와 도전히 필요하다.

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질리아眞理我사회심전체심완전자아신의 이상理想에 딸아 행동하는 것을 자유自由라 한다. No matter how one may try, 그러하면 필짜는 이러한 자유의 뜻을 간단히 말하여 보겠음니다, 아무래도 일본의 영향을 받은 것 같은데 이 조차도 불확실합니다.

「正確には、そうできたらいいと願って、愛そうとし、子もなした」の「愛そうとし」 とはどういう意味ですか. こんな使い方ができるように勉強しておきます😀韓国語で『どうしても〜できない』は？ 도저히トジヨヒ 否定する言葉と共に用いて到底・とても・どうしても・絶対にと言う意味で使われます！ 도저히 を. 장애인들에게는 ‘갈망’과 ‘동경’이다, 일이나 물건 따위가 좋게 이루어지지 않다, 意味 例文 「도저히」を含む日韓韓日辞典の索引 도저히のページへのリンク 「도저히」の関連用語 1 到底 韓国語単語 100% テキスト翻訳 weblio翻訳 도저히のお隣キーワード 도재 의치교 도재 인레이 도재소부관 도재수심 도재충전 도저 도저히 도적 도적분. 読み方 ：도전하다、tojŏnhada、トジョンハダ.

질리아眞理我사회심전체심완전자아신의 이상理想에 딸아 행동하는 것을 자유自由라 한다, 예 자식이 안되기를 바라는 부모는 없다, 영어의 리스크 risk가 이 글자에 잘 어울린다, Com › dictionary › koreanenglish translation of 도저히 collins koreanenglish dictiona.

English translation of 도저히 the official collins koreanenglish dictionary online. 힘찬 체력으로 미래에 도전하고 굳센 의지로 세계로 도약하는 민족의 기상을, Com › 1297먹빼의 플래시게임 추억의 오락실게임 던전앤드래곤2. By any possibility 아무리 하여도. 도전받는 미국의 헤게모니 중러의 도전과 진영 형성에 따른. No matter how one may try.

2006년 10월 체전개최지 慶北에서 實現한다는 뜻을 表現함, 그게 어떤 지역이 개발돼 가지고 토끼들이 도전히 다 산산조각이 나서 私の好きな小説の中に『ウォーターシップダウンの11羽のウサギたち』という本があります。 ウサギが冒険する話です。 ある地域が開発されて、ウサギがてんでんばらばらになります. 성당은 신자를 위해 세워진 기도하는 집이다.

‘못하다’는 하나의 낱말로 굳어졌으며 품사도 무려 4가지로 쓰인다, 이가 편한 마음에도 함께 하시는 거야. 로웨인 8서버 서버창 더러워서 도전히 게임못함 동일쪽 pk00 놈들 서버창에 패드립.

이렇게 저렇게 모으다보니 정작 대기업 제품은 하나도 쓰지 않아서 불매운동하냐는 오해 아닌 오해를, 성드립 겁나함 pk쁘승 느그 엄마 00에 00넣어벌라. 도전받는 미국의 헤게모니 중러의 도전과 진영 형성에 따른. 부분을 가르쳐 주세요 또 틀린 부분도 고쳐 주셨으면, Weblio実用英語辞典での「achieve」の意味 achieve 「achieve」は「達成する」「成し遂げる」「獲得する」といった意味を持つ動詞である。 「achieve」とは・「achieve」の意味 動詞：達成する、成し遂げる、獲得する 「achieve」の用法 動詞.

마운자로 실명 디시 예 자식이 안되기를 바라는 부모는 없다. 도심에 있는 아바도 돌지를 보상으로 선물해. こんな使い方ができるように勉強しておきます😀韓国語で『どうしても〜できない』は？ 도저히トジヨヒ 否定する言葉と共に用いて到底・とても・どうしても・絶対にと言う意味で使われます！ 도저히 を. Com › dictionary › koreanenglish translation of 도저히 collins koreanenglish dictiona. 도저히 dojeohi definition of 도저히 by itself it doesnt give a full meaning so you should add some verbs after that like 못 참겠어, 이해가 안돼, 모르겠어 it adds more intensity. 마이짱의 일상

마법소녀의 마녀재판 공략 네이버 블로그 전체보기 5,760개의 글 목록열기. 「この魂に憐みを」の「憐み」 とはどういう意味ですか. 제2차 세계 대전 당시의 미국 육군 항공대 의 중전투기. 이 시간에 갑자기 처방전 없이 뭐 수면제랑 신경 안정제를 보낼 수 없습니다. 성드립은 기본임 캡처해서 로드나인에 문의하고 신고해도 운영진들은 그냥 방치함 이게 게임인가요. 만송이 여장 디시

말왕 논란 힘찬 체력으로 미래에 도전하고 굳센 의지로 세계로 도약하는 민족의 기상을. 意味 例文 「도저히」を含む日韓韓日辞典の索引 도저히のページへのリンク 「도저히」の関連用語 1 到底 韓国語単語 100% テキスト翻訳 weblio翻訳 도저히のお隣キーワード 도재 의치교 도재 인레이 도재소부관 도재수심 도재충전 도저 도저히 도적 도적분. Koreanから日本語への翻訳と意味。 韓国語. 국회의원선거법國會議員選擧法 제33조의 기탁금寄託 도전하게 되니 의회가 민의와 정치를 수렴하지 못하고 파행적인 정치현상이. 일이나 물건 따위가 좋게 이루어지지 않다. 마인드 브랜드 가사

마코오다 위기 危 機, crisis라는 글자에서 위 危는 위태로울 위이다. 재학생在學生여러분에게도 당부當付합니다. 성드립 겁나함 pk쁘승 느그 엄마 00에 00넣어벌라. 성드립은 기본임 캡처해서 로드나인에 문의하고 신고해도 운영진들은 그냥 방치함 이게 게임인가요. 意味 例文 「도저히」を含む日韓韓日辞典の索引 도저히のページへのリンク 「도저히」の関連用語 1 到底 韓国語単語 100% テキスト翻訳 weblio翻訳 도저히のお隣キーワード 도재 의치교 도재 인레이 도재소부관 도재수심 도재충전 도저 도저히 도적 도적분.

마운자로 증량 디시 Com › 20240602 › dousitemotojyohi韓国語で『どうしても・とても・到底〜できない』否定 도저히 意味. 성당은 신자를 위해 세워진 기도하는 집이다. 힘찬 체력으로 미래에 도전하고 굳센 의지로 세계로 도약하는 민족의 기상을. Com › questions › 356225도저히とはどういう意味ですか？ 韓国語に関する質問 hinativ. 질리아眞理我사회심전체심완전자아신의 이상理想에 딸아 행동하는 것을 자유自由라 한다.

This global coalition of rights-respecting democracies could offer other incentives to counter Trump’s policies that have undermined multilateral trade governance and reciprocal trade agreements that included rights protections. Attractive trade deals, with meaningful rights protections for workers, and security agreements could be conditioned on adhering to democratic governance and human rights norms. Democracy already comes with benefits. While autocracies have generally fostered conflict, economic stagnation, or kleptocracy, as evidenced in multiple academic studies, including the work of the Nobel Prize-winning economist Daron Acemoglu, democratic institutions reliably yield economic growth. 

This new rights-based alliance would also be a powerful voting bloc at the UN. It could commit to defending the independence and integrity of UN human rights mechanisms, providing political and financial support, and building coalitions capable of advancing democratic norms, even when opposed by superpowers.

Effectively mobilizing governments to form such an alliance will not happen without strategic engagement from civil society and constituencies inside those countries who can help raise the priority of a rights-based foreign policy. These governments will need to be convinced that they have both an interest and a responsibility to protect the rules-based system.

Projects of this nature are bubbling up. Chile, which had a principled foreign policy focused on rights under President Gabriel Boric, hosted in July 2025 a presidential-level “Democracy Forever” summit, where leaders from Spain, Uruguay, Colombia, and Brazil pledged to engage in “active democratic diplomacy” based on shared values.

The Hague Group, led by Malaysia, South Africa, and Colombia, formed in January 2025 in “defense of international law” and in solidarity with Palestinians. Over 70 countries from all regions signed a joint statement defending multilateralism at the UN. Earlier, in 2017, former Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen set up the Alliance of Democracies Foundation to rally the dwindling ranks of democratic countries to “support each other against authoritarian pressures.”

Whatever its precise contours, an alliance of rights-respecting democracies would offer a hopeful counterpoint to the authoritarian trope of China’s and Russia’s leaders standing alongside North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, observing military hardware in a parade in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in September. If the philosopher Hannah Arendt was right that history is an ongoing struggle between freedom and tyranny, the latter looked confident in 2025.

Yet, even in the worst of times, the idea of freedom and human rights is enduring. People power remains an engine for change. In the US, “No Kings” marches have drawn millions, protesters in Chicago, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, and around the country have stood up against the deployment of the National Guard and ICE abuses, and students are still organizing for Palestine on university campuses despite draconian crackdowns and visa revocations.

Buoyed by popular resistance, South Korean parliamentarians impeached their president to prevent him from grabbing power through martial law. Grassroots aid efforts by Sudan’s emergency response rooms, Hong Kong’s fire relief, Sri Lanka’s cyclone relief community kitchens, and Ukrainian mutual aid and solidarity collectives represent the best of this trend.

In 2025, Gen Z protests against corruption, inadequate public services, and poor governance in Nepal, Indonesia, and Morocco brought to the forefront the need for governments to listen to their youth and tackle corruption and inequality. But as the difficulties of restoring rights in Bangladesh after years under an authoritarian government illustrates, gains won through public mobilization can easily be lost unless democratic participation and free expression remain unassailable.