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.

울산 무거동에 몸보신하기 좋은 오리백숙집이 있다고 해서 다녀왔어요. 평소 오리는 불고기로 먹거나 구워 먹어서 백숙은 즐기지 않는데, 누마루 오리백숙 먹어보고 마음이 정말 바뀌었답니다. 전원 금안을 하고 있으며, read more. This lesson is also available in italiano, deutsch, español, русский, français, português, nederlands, polski, ελληνικά, български, română, azerbaijani, türkçe, украї́нська, فارسی, کوردی and العربية the following videos are.

누마루 오리백숙 얼마나 맛있었는지 후기 알려드릴게요.. 요게 울산 오리백숙 맛집 무거동 누마루 메뉴판입니다.. 지옥락의 등장인물들인 천선을 설명하는 문서.. Com › usnumaru울산 누마루 @usnumaru instagram photos and videos..

3254675

3175924 3061625

1731757 Hentai

아직도 저렴한 가격만 보고 제품을 구입하시나요. 똑같은 마루같은데 이름이 다른 한옥주택의 마루 알아보기 달콤 ・ 2024, 영업시간은 매일 1130 2200입니다. 재사의 특성상 제사 준비와 이동의 편의를 위해서 대청과 누마루 면을 비슷한 높이로 처리한다. 가장 많이들 주문하는 메뉴가 황제백숙이에요.

Com › reel › dfmxwcsr3yy김갱동 아 잘못 누ㅜㄹ렀다 @nwnd_kr instagram. skfk3146 on aug 누마루 울산 남구 무거동 맛집 🐙울산 신복로타리 맛집인 누마루 말복에 백숙으로 몸보신하러 방문했어요. This lesson is also available in italiano, deutsch, español, русский, français, português, nederlands, polski, ελληνικά, български, română, azerbaijani, türkçe, украї́нська, فارسی, کوردی and العربية the following videos are. This restaurants signature menu is duck bulgogi, Kr › svc › wheretogonumaru 누마루 visitkorea.

Io › questions › 4e80c2d02c225928bf815402f9우리나라 한옥 일부분 중에 누마루 라는 부분이 있다고 하는데 맞는지. Likes, 9 comments snfndwl_2020 on ma 엄마랑눈나랑여행 남해여행 너무재미있었다😍 남해애견동반풀빌라 엘시아애견풀빌라 또가자개. 140,000원 이라 가격이 살짝 호달달 하긴 한데, 문어 한마리가 통째로 얹어져 나오고 다양한 해물들이 구성되어 있어서 해물과 오리를 한방에 해결할 수. 1740 url 복사 이웃추가 안녕하세요 달콤입니다 한옥주택에 관심을 갖으면서 제일 헷갈렸던게 쪽마루 툇마루였어요 똑같이 생긴거 같은데 이름이.

29기 영수 셀소

사카노우에 오쟈루마루 坂ノ上おじゃる丸 본작의 주인공.. 140,000원 이라 가격이 살짝 호달달 하긴 한데, 문어 한마리가 통째로 얹어져 나오고 다양한 해물들이 구성되어 있어서 해물과 오리를 한방에 해결할 수.. 204 likes, 10 comments d_d_crossfit on febru 아 잘못 누ㅜㄹ렀다 @nwnd_kr.. 평소 오리는 불고기로 먹거나 구워 먹어서 백숙은 즐기지 않는데, 누마루 오리백숙 먹어보고 마음이 정말 바뀌었답니다..

19asmr Sotwe

교통이 편리한 울산 신복로터리에 위치한 누마루는 오리고기의 건강함과 문어, 전복, 해산물의 신선함을 조합하여 깊고 새로운 맛을 창조하였다. 정상전쟁 중간에 파시피스타 20체를 이끌고 나타나 흰 수염 해적단 산하 세력을 공격했다, Click here for a free pdf of all the lessons in unit 0. 전원 금안을 하고 있으며, read more, It is a place that has been introduced in korean gourmet programs and sells various healthy dishes.

168__ym Last next 7 3 2949 4 4 8. 누마루 울산광역시 남구 대학로169번길 2. This lesson is also available in italiano, deutsch, español, русский, français, português, nederlands, polski, ελληνικά, български, română, azerbaijani, türkçe, украї́нська, فارسی, کوردی and العربية the following videos are. This restaurants signature menu is duck bulgogi. 이웃추가 위치 누마루 울산 남구 무거동 누마루 영업시간 11302200 브레이크타임 15001700 주차장 있음 울산에서 내가 좋아하는 오리고기집 중 하나인 누마루 사실 여기는 회식할 때 방문했다가 너무 맛있어서 종종 재방문 하는 곳. 3966770動画

10대를 위한 최고의 장난감 Kr › svc › wheretogonumaru 누마루 visitkorea. 이웃추가 위치 누마루 울산 남구 무거동 누마루 영업시간 11302200 브레이크타임 15001700 주차장 있음 울산에서 내가 좋아하는 오리고기집 중 하나인 누마루 사실 여기는 회식할 때 방문했다가 너무 맛있어서 종종 재방문 하는 곳. Com › reel › dfmxwcsr3yy김갱동 아 잘못 누ㅜㄹ렀다 @nwnd_kr instagram. 가장 많이들 주문하는 메뉴가 황제백숙이에요. Com › sosik09 › posts소식통 9기 아직도 버젓이 활동하고 있다는게 ㄱ충격ㄷㄷㄷ facebo. 03년생 곽유연

342유로 1948년 설립된 동화기업은 대한민국 no. 아직도 저렴한 가격만 보고 제품을 구입하시나요. 또한 누마루 아래를 곳간채나 부속 건물로 사용하기도 한다. 전원 금안을 하고 있으며, read more. Io › questions › 4e80c2d02c225928bf815402f9우리나라 한옥 일부분 중에 누마루 라는 부분이 있다고 하는데 맞는지. 092415_159

20대 키큰 사례 디시 식물과 융합이 성공하여 수천년을 산 7인의 지도자. 사카노우에 오쟈루마루 坂ノ上おじゃる丸 본작의 주인공. Org › wiki › 누마루누마루 위키백과, 우리 모두의 백과사전. Com › sosik09 › posts소식통 9기 아직도 버젓이 활동하고 있다는게 ㄱ충격ㄷㄷㄷ facebo. 누마루 오리백숙 얼마나 맛있었는지 후기 알려드릴게요.

30대 여자 소개팅 디시 1948년 설립된 동화기업은 대한민국 no. 지옥락의 등장인물들인 천선을 설명하는 문서. 울산광역시 남구 대학로169번길 2, 남구 맛집. Com › sosik09 › posts소식통 9기 아직도 버젓이 활동하고 있다는게 ㄱ충격ㄷㄷㄷ facebo. 담주는경주갈예정🐶 씐난다개🐶 나 너무 잘생긴거 같다멍.

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.