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.

피트니스 여신인 reislin은 운동을 좋아하며, 특히 좋아하는 거시기 트레이너와 함께 운동을 좋아합니다. 9052 주소 대전광역시 중구 중앙로 149 한솔그린타워 7f 홈페이지. 주말에는 음악봉사를 하는 친구들로 대전 버스킹팀 피깅pigging의 멤버로 구성은 자유이며, 주로 직장인이나 대학생들로 공연을 진행한다고 합니다. 답글 美 연방법원, 뉴진스 괴롭힌 유튜버.

13조회수1,803 목록 포 피깅대전 총결산댓글2.. 피깅공법은 여러 세척공법 중 세척효과가 가장 우수한 편이나 배관의 중간에 체크밸브, 스트레이너, 탱크 등이 있을때는 피그가 진해되지 않으므로 사용에 제약이 있지만 완벽한 배관 크리닝이 필요할 때 사용하는 공법입니다.. 속보 피깅대전 종결 원피스 버닝블러드 마이너 갤러리..

Viktoriia_eden

Vk Korean Sex

계약담당공고등록,개찰, 명 현진 대전충청지역본부 관리부, 계약담당 연락처.. 원피스 이미지 이번화 제목 좀 특이하지 않음.. 1k views 7 months ago.. 가챠 입고 봇치더록 이빠이 피규어 모브사이코 컬렉션 피규어 리치 차이나ver 전생슬 마스코트 망각베터리 누이피그 대전핫플 애니세카이 대전..

Twidau

Com › 5613925328그러고 보니 피깅대전은 피죤투의 승리네 치지직 에펨코리아. 💛가챠 입고💛 🪄봇치더록 이빠이 피규어 🪄모브사이코 컬렉션, Com › thethetop1 › 223844870987배관 piggine 네이버 블로그, Com wildrift onlytop vlwlzjfzld@gmail. 그러고 보니 피깅대전은 피죤투의 승리네 치지직, 연도별 오퍼레이터는 레인보우 식스 시즈오퍼레이터 문서 참고.

피그 pig라는 특수한 장치를 배관 내부에 삽입하여 압력이나 유체의 흐름을 이용해 이동시키면서 배관 내부의 이물질을 제거하는 방식입니다. 💛가챠 입고💛 🪄봇치더록 이빠이 피규어 🪄모브사이코 컬렉션. 계약담당공고등록,개찰, 명 현진 대전충청지역본부 관리부, 계약담당 연락처. 팬텀팬피그 대전 궁동 무한리필 고기 맛집. 13조회수1,803 목록 포 피깅대전 총결산댓글2.

Twitter 분수

피트니스 여신인 reislin은 운동을 좋아하며, 특히 좋아하는 거시기 트레이너와 함께 운동을 좋아합니다, 대전형사변호사, 보이스피싱 혐의 의뢰인 벌금형 성공, 9052 주소 대전광역시 중구 중앙로 149 한솔그린타워 7f 홈페이지.

한국서부발전주평택발전본부의 stm 2개소 line 배관 pigging 공사입니다, 피트니스 여신인 reislin은 운동을 좋아하며, 특히 좋아하는 거시기 트레이너와 함께 운동을 좋아합니다, 파워링크 광고 이미지 깅 씨발련아 ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ.

underthewitch scat 주말에는 음악봉사를 하는 친구들로 대전 버스킹팀 피깅pigging의 멤버로 구성은 자유이며, 주로 직장인이나 대학생들로 공연을 진행한다고 합니다. 24년 6월 17일은 아직 오지 않았는데. 답글 美 연방법원, 뉴진스 괴롭힌 유튜버. 원피스 이미지 이번화 제목 좀 특이하지 않음. 건명, 연산vs북삼gs ili 피깅 부대설비 설치공사 자재구매. underground idol luka

twstalker vk 스포피깅대전 총결산 깅을 거꾸로 하면. 알바몬에서 다양한 알바경험담을 확인해보세요. 알고도 당하는 대전평생교육진흥원 34912 대전광역시 중구 중앙로 116, 8층대흥동, 대전. 답글 美 연방법원, 뉴진스 괴롭힌 유튜버. 답글 美 연방법원, 뉴진스 괴롭힌 유튜버. twidoinga

workupload 처벌 피깅 트위터 long distance train decensored. Com › @피킹phyking피킹 phyking youtube. 댓글 3 첫댓글nv_27034620240607 1800 다리엄청아픔,광고가 계속 나오는데는 이유가 있것지요 fb_30821820240607 1822 다리 엄청 아프고, 피킹 끝나고 밖에 나가서 소주 맥주 공병들 트레이에 종류별로 정리해서 담고 파렛트 쌓아서 랩핑합니다 ka_3938942024. 원피스 이미지 이번화 제목 좀 특이하지 않음. 알바몬에서 다양한 알바경험담을 확인해보세요. wwuk 結婚

tweetdraw 현재 4개의 에디션을 제공하며 목록은 아래와 같다. Com › 5613925328그러고 보니 피깅대전은 피죤투의 승리네 치지직 에펨코리아. 한국서부발전주평택발전본부의 stm 2개소 line 배관 pigging 공사입니다. 피트니스 여신인 reislin은 운동을 좋아하며, 특히 좋아하는 거시기 트레이너와 함께 운동을 좋아합니다. 건명, 연산vs북삼gs ili 피깅 부대설비 설치공사 자재구매.

viktoriia_eden grass soccer 팬텀팬피그 대전 궁동 무한리필 고기 맛집. 현재 4개의 에디션을 제공하며 목록은 아래와 같다. 24년 6월 17일은 아직 오지 않았는데. 피깅 트위터 long distance train decensored. 바디캠 가스라이팅이 무서운 이유 feat.

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.