What follows is an excerpt from Michael McFaul’s latest book, “Autocrats vs. Democrats: China, Russia, America, and the New Global Disorder,” published Oct. 28, 2025.
American support for democracy around the world during the Cold War was imperfect, hypocritical and sometimes ineffective. At times, especially after the Communist takeover in China in 1949 and again in the 1970s, communism appeared to be winning the contest of ideas. But the trend eventually reversed. By the end of the Cold War, more people and countries embraced democratic ideas. U.S. policies and programs contributed positively to this phenomenon. In turn, the expansion of democracy enhanced our security. Democratic transitions created new American allies in Germany, Italy, Japan and Eastern Europe. The expansion of democracy also opened markets for American business and gave U.S. companies new investment and trade opportunities. They can again today.
In the past decade, however, democratic forces around the world have achieved very few outright victories. Globally, we have endured two decades of democratic recession. The challenges of democratic backsliding are compounded by the perception, especially in the developing world, of a well-performing Chinese economic model outperforming economies in democracies. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s brand of orthodox nationalist populism also has attracted millions of followers in the older democracies of Europe and in the United States. There is also a growing perception that democracy overall, both new and old, is not delivering.
If American leaders want to win the ideological contest with China and Russia in this century, we must devote more attention to improving our democratic system of government at home.
American democracy endured real challenges during the Cold War, especially in the 1960s and early 1970s, but nothing like today. If American leaders want to win the ideological contest with China and Russia in this century, we must devote more attention to improving our democratic system of government at home. That project should include automatic voter registration, better management and funding of polling places, fewer restrictions on voter participation, and making Election Day a national holiday. American democracy also desperately needs campaign-finance reform to provide transparency about candidates’ funding sources and more ambitiously limit the sums that individuals can provide candidates. Our elections need better protection from foreign interference, including cybersecurity, transparency about foreign media and a ban on in-kind support from international actors. Partisan redistricting for congressional elections must eventually end. Primaries controlled by political parties that promote extremist candidates should be replaced by open primaries where the top four candidates reach the second round of voting irrespective of party affiliation. States that have adopted this system have already chosen less extreme officials. Ranked-choice voting improves democratic performance. Where it is practiced, including in New York and Maine, ranked-choice voting has punished extremist candidates and rewarded those seeking broader support.
The undemocratic practice of taxation without representation for residents of the District of Columbia and American territories such as Puerto Rico should also end. Better border security and additional resources to support legal immigration would improve American democracy. Increased transparency about methods social media companies use to curate their content and new regulations for artificial intelligence, including requirements to tag deep fakes and regulations for testing of new AI models for safety, would strengthen American democracy as well. Most ambitiously, American believers in a more representative democracy should support the passage of legislation to end the Electoral College. This 18th-century artifact denies American voters the ability to elect the president of the United States directly.
Most urgently, the assaults on democratic practices launched by President Donald Trump in his second term must be slowed and reversed. In his first year back in office, Trump has tried to dramatically expand the power of the executive branch, including shutting down entire federal agencies without any input from the U.S. Congress. He has also invoked national security to impose the most sweeping set of tariffs in a hundred years, again without any congressional involvement, even though the U.S. Constitution assigns this power to the legislative branch. Most alarmingly for the future of the rule of law and the system of checks and balances — foundations of American democracy — the Trump administration has wrongly jailed and deported immigrants with legal protected status and has also used indictments as an instrument of intimidation against Trump critics, a tool right out of Putin’s playbook. Trump and his team have also signaled intentions that would violate the Fourteenth Amendment, which guarantees birthright citizenship. These are just a few examples.
This list of democratic reforms and defenses is only partial and contains sweeping shoulds and musts that are easy to list and hard to achieve. Some readers might read my list of reforms as partisan. That is not my intention. Instead, I aim to suggest reforms that would strengthen American democratic institutions — the rules of the game of democracy — without wading into policy debates between Republicans and Democrats or conservatives and liberals. U.S. foreign policy makers must understand the connection between improving democracy at home and pursuing national interests abroad. The United States cannot claim to be the leader of the free world if anti-democratic practices in our system are ignored, let alone allowed to grow.
In the current era of great-power competition, the superiority of our democratic ideas is one of our most significant advantages, alongside advancing our economic and security interests. China may outperform us in making electric vehicles. Russia has many more military mercenaries than we do. But both are far behind the United States and our democratic allies in the contest of ideas. When was the last time you saw tens of thousands protesting in the streets to demand a one-man dictatorship or Communist Party rule? Even during the past two decades of democratic decay, mass protests in support of democracy still happen frequently in repressive countries like Iran, Belarus and Venezuela. People go to jail for years or are killed for supporting democratic ideas. Two of my friends — Boris Nemtsov and Alexei Navalny — were killed in Russia for holding the audacious belief that the Russian people should elect their leaders. Jails in Hong Kong, Xinjiang and other Chinese cities are filled with brave people who have similar beliefs. No one goes to jail in democracies today for supporting communism or Putinism.
In the long struggle between autocrats and democrats that will shape great-power competition for most of this century, the free world has better and more popular ideas. To take advantage of this ideational power on the international stage, however, America has got to get back to practicing democracy better at home. We have done it before. We can do it again.
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