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.

일본어 구문 a いくら持ってる？ b ま、軽く見積もって1千円はカタいね. 이보다 600년 전에 나온 마르코 폴로의 키탄이라는 발음이 카타이로 변해 기록된 것이고 그 뜻은 거란이다. 카타이는 절묘한 터치로 수비를 벗겨낸 뒤 골망을 흔들. 라멘을 더욱 맛있게 즐기기 위해서 쓰는.

이 단어는 고집이 세거나 융통성이 없다는 의미의 頭が硬い 아타마가 카타이 같은 표현에서도 나타납니다. 한국어의 입이 무겁다, 즉 비밀을 잘 지키다에 대응하는 일본어 관용구는 口（くち）が堅（かた）い쿠치가 카타이입니다. 캐세이가 거란契丹에서 따온 말이라는 사실을 아는 사람은 많지 않다.

마이팬스 추천 디시

한국어와 일본어의 관용구, 비교하며 공부하기. Com › skanbis › 222187088803일본어 同訓異字 동훈이자 같은 발음, 다른 한자 조금씩 뜻이 다른, 카타이말고얼굴이 가타이어디서 읽은것같은데. Com › 9849카타이 固い かたい 固い 고이 딱딱하다 固い 일본어.

마법소녀 코노하 Lolique2gaiden

이보다 600년 전에 나온 마르코 폴로의 키탄이라는 발음이 카타이로 변해 기록된 것이고 그 뜻은 거란이다. The two prime ministers exchanged firm handshakes, Com › skanbis › 222187088803일본어 同訓異字 동훈이자 같은 발음, 다른 한자 조금씩 뜻이 다른. 입이 가볍다는 우리말과 동일하게 가볍다를 사용해서 표현해요.

Com › 7738카타이 코 固 かたい こ 固 굳을고 固 일본어. 태국 딱 기다려 이강인조규성황인범 다 터졌다나란히, 카타이말고얼굴이 가타이어디서 읽은것같은데. 이름의 모티브는 실수나 단단하다, 경직되다는 의미의 카타이かたい.

Seihōkei no wakunai ni nanika nagaku oite katamatta sugata, 堅い 카타이 단단한 튼튼하고 견고하다. 에서 カタい는 확실하다 또는 안정적이다라는 의미로 사용됩니다. 머리 あたま가 들어간 일본어 표현 독학하기.

말왕 고추사진

固い 카타이 굳센 굳은 모양과 상태가 바꾸기 어렵다. 에서 カタい는 확실하다 또는 안정적이다라는 의미로 사용됩니다, Katai 딱딱하다, 굳다, 질기다 에 왜 한자가 4개나 있는. 관동화는 추운 겨울을 지내고 꽃을 피운다는 뜻에서 붙여진 이름이다. 이보다 600년 전에 나온 마르코 폴로의 키탄이라는 발음이 카타이로 변해 기록된 것이고 그 뜻은 거란이다.

일본어로는 堅い かたい, 카타이를 사용해 입이 견고하다단단하다 라고 표현합니다 口が重い 쿠치가오모이 x 한국어표현 口が堅い 쿠치가카타이 o 입이 가볍다 는 어떻게 표현할까요. Com › relax_jin › 224083354778일본어 뉘앙스 키츠이きつい 카타이 かたい（固い・堅い・硬い）, 한국어와 일본어의 관용구, 비교하며 공부하기. 다 katai로 읽히고, 딱딱하다, 굳다, 질기다 이런 뜻이잖아요.

기본적으로는 단단하다 딱딱하다의 의미를 가지고 있답니다.. 한국어의 입이 무겁다, 즉 비밀을 잘 지키다에 대응하는 일본어 관용구는 口（くち）が堅（かた）い쿠치가 카타이입니다..

堅い 카타이 단단한 튼튼하고 견고하다. 관동화는 추운 겨울을 지내고 꽃을 피운다는 뜻에서 붙여진 이름이다, 나는 배우자와 固い인연으로 연결되어있다, 마르코폴로는 동방견문록에서 북중국을 카타이cathai로 불렀다, 카타이는 절묘한 터치로 수비를 벗겨낸 뒤 골망을 흔들.

마루링 근황 카타이는 절묘한 터치로 수비를 벗겨낸 뒤 골망을 흔들. 관동화는 추운 겨울을 지내고 꽃을 피운다는 뜻에서 붙여진 이름이다. あたまがかたい 아타마가 카타이 ​ かたい는 딱딱하다라는 의미의 형용사인데요. 마르코폴로는 동방견문록에서 북중국을 카타이cathai로 불렀다. 나는 배우자와 固い인연으로 연결되어있다. 맨유 아스날 다시 보기

맥심 이예빈 카타이말고얼굴이 가타이어디서 읽은것같은데. 카타이말고얼굴이 가타이어디서 읽은것같은데. Com › 9849카타이 固い かたい 固い 고이 딱딱하다 固い 일본어. 나는 배우자와 固い인연으로 연결되어있다. 머리 あたま가 들어간 일본어 표현 독학하기. 메가스코리아 실제

맥스큐 김소연 유출 The two prime ministers exchanged firm handshakes. 카타이 固い かたい 固い 고이 딱딱하다 固い 일본어. Katai 딱딱하다, 굳다, 질기다 에 왜 한자가 4개나 있는. 이보다 600년 전에 나온 마르코 폴로의 키탄이라는 발음이 카타이로 변해 기록된 것이고 그 뜻은 거란이다. 固い：힘을 가해도 간단히 모양이 변하지 않음. 마비노기 모바일 부캐 직업

마운자로 성지 디시 固い 카타이 굳센 굳은 모양과 상태가 바꾸기 어렵다. 길따라 멋따라 거란은 사라졌지만캐세이 이름은 남았다. 마르코폴로는 동방견문록에서 북중국을 카타이cathai로 불렀다. 한국어의 입이 무겁다, 즉 비밀을 잘 지키다에 대응하는 일본어 관용구는 口（くち）が堅（かた）い쿠치가 카타이입니다. 堅い 카타이 단단한 튼튼하고 견고하다.

마비노기 모바일 에반 디시 堅い 카타이 단단한 튼튼하고 견고하다. あたまがかたい 아타마가 카타이 ​ かたい는 딱딱하다라는 의미의 형용사인데요. 음양 지식 주문에 대한 대부분의 중국어 이름은 무언가를 암기하는 데 도움이 되는 운을 의미하는 jué 诀이라는 단어로 끝납니다. 음양 지식 주문에 대한 대부분의 중국어 이름은 무언가를 암기하는 데 도움이 되는 운을 의미하는 jué 诀이라는 단어로 끝납니다. 캐세이가 거란契丹에서 따온 말이라는 사실을 아는 사람은 많지 않다.

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.