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Dan Pemstein

@danpemstein.com
4.2K followers 1.3K following 162 posts

Political economist working mostly on democratic institutions, tech, political careers and party org, and measurement. www.danpemstein.com digitalsocietyproject.org

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Reposted by Dan Pemstein
ProPublica @propublica.org · 26/09/2026
Hey, ProPublica reporter Jake Pearson here. I’m taking over the account to tell you about my new story. For months, I posed as a problem gambler on DraftKings to test the company's "responsible gaming" safeguards. Spoiler alert: They made me a VIP — and I lost $10K. Here's how it all went down. 🧵
Selfie taken by ProPublica reporter Jake Pearson, a man wearing a backwards baseball cap and an orange T-shirt.
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High Country News @highcountrynews.org · 26/09/2026
Amid a record-breaking year of Western bear conflict, the historically tolerant Red Lodge community is grappling with opposing views on how to live with the species — and if a ‘fed bear’ really should be a ‘dead bear.’ buff.ly/wfv6lgy
buff.ly
As bears ‘spin out’ in southern Montana, wildlife managers are at wit’s end - High Country News
Amid a record-breaking year of Western bear conflict, the historically tolerant Red Lodge community is grappling with opposing views on how to live with the species — and if a 'fed bear' really…
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 14/09/2026
Fargo area folks, the Department of Political Science & Public Policy at NDSU is hosting a public lecture by @bcburden.bsky.social, about the 2026 US Election, on Oct 1, at 6pm, in Minard Hall (Room 230). Hope to see you there!
Event flyer for The Curtis Amlund Speaker Series, dark green background with yellow accents. Headline: "Challenges and Resilience in U.S. Elections." Photo of presenter Barry Burden, a man with glasses and a beard, smiling. Text reads: Presenter: Barry Burden, Professor of Political Science, Director of the Elections Research Center, and the Lyons Family Chair in Electoral Politics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Host: Department of Political Science & Public Policy. Time: Thursday, Oct. 1, 2026, 6 p.m. Location: Minard 230. Description: The 2026 midterm elections are again testing election infrastructure in the United States. Election administration has weathered serious threats in recent years, testing the fortitude of the practices and systems essential for democracy to succeed. This talk identifies the challenges unique to this year's election cycle and assesses the readiness of government officials, stakeholders, and the public to respond. NDSU Political Science and Public Policy logo at bottom.
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 25/09/2026
I have a back-burner project that examines whether or not the relationship between women's labor force participation and women's descriptive political representation is causal, focusing on the US. Short answer is: seems unlikely. Posting the working paper, to keep it half out of the file drawer.
First page of a working paper.

Did Rosie the Riveter Send Ms. Smith to Washington?

Daniel Pemstein
Department of Political Science & Public Policy
North Dakota State University
September 25, 2026

Abstract
Scholars have long argued that women’s labor force participation increases their descriptive representation. Labor participation plausibly affects both demand- (e.g., voter norms) and supply-side (e.g., women in political feeder professions) determinants of descriptive representation. While findings are mixed, on balance, women’s labor
force participation and descriptive political representation correlate, at least in crossnational panel studies. But establishing a causal connection between labor participation and descriptive representation is difficult. The two variables are likely endogenous and relationships between them are almost certainly confounded. I take advantage of a
plausibly exogenous instrument for labor participation—county-level variation in U.S. World War II casualties that differentially increased women’s work-force participation across localities—to test whether women’s labor participation causes descriptive
representation.

WORKING PAPER
Please check with the author for an updated version before citing.

I would like to thank Andreas Ferrara, who generously shared WWII draftee casualty data. This work used resources of the Center for Computationally Assisted Science and Technology (CCAST) at North Dakota State University, which were made possible in part by NSF MRI Award No. 2019077.
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 25/09/2026
My first grader got a polaroid camera for his birthday and wanted to repurpose a cloth-bound copy of A Christmas Carol as an album. Found a guy in Baltimore who hand binds blank books (and has exquisite penmanship). The book is beautiful, so wanted to give the store a plug: pencilrevolution.com
A light blue cloth bound book, sitting on a table.Inner cover and first page of the book. Inner cover has a sticker saying "J. F. GAMBER BOOKBINDER, PENCIL REVOLUTION PRESS LLC, member guild of book workers" and a child's writing that says: "Hello and MY Name is Kieran This is my Photo ALBUM" The first page says "Kieran's Photo Book"Two pages from the book. Left: some small Polaroids of toys and stuffies. Right: Child's writing that says: "if eneBODY Fiends This Book BienDer Keep it saefe Beacus it is SpeshLe Beacus it is my Photo Book"Exquisitely handwritten note on Pencil Revolution Press stationary that says: "Thanks, Daniel!

Hope this finds you enjoying a nice, crisp early autumn!

Best Regards from Charm City, Johnny"
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Joyce Park @troutgirl.bsky.social · 22/11/2025
I once knew a Federal bank examiner, and one time someone asked him why we had to KEEP inspecting banks over and over. He basically said every new batch of business school grads invents bank fraud from first principles.
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Anthony DeBarros @anthonydb.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
My @wsj.com colleagues put AI-related spending in context with America's earlier large infrastructure buildouts. It's massive. (Gift link.) www.wsj.com/economy/the-...
wsj.com
The AI Build-Out Is Becoming the Biggest Economic Bet in U.S. History
Data-center spending is greater than that for canals, railroads and grid combined—creating jobs and stock-market wealth, while boosting inflation and crowding out housing.
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Nanjala @nanjala.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Our new volume on Global Platform Governance is now available for pre-orders, gathering perspectives from academics and practitioners all over the world on key debates around regulating platforms so that folks are not just engaging what works for the US or the EU. www.bloomsbury.com/uk/global-pl...
bloomsbury.com
Global Platform Governance
This is a field-defining open access playbook for identifying and responding to the global regulatory challenges created by large digital platforms.Here Nanjala…
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 16/09/2026
I now have to file 2-3 separate reimbursement requests for every work trip, because my university's accounting office has interpreted the new IRS 60 day rule (honestly, just taking their word that this is even a thing) in the absolute worst possible way.
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Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · 15/09/2026
I am so tired of how we have been saying this for more than a decade by this point
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Ian Campbell @iwcampbell.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
NDSU’s punter might hold the record for kinds of cultural experience in a six year span
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 14/09/2026
Fargo area folks, the Department of Political Science & Public Policy at NDSU is hosting a public lecture by @bcburden.bsky.social, about the 2026 US Election, on Oct 1, at 6pm, in Minard Hall (Room 230). Hope to see you there!
Event flyer for The Curtis Amlund Speaker Series, dark green background with yellow accents. Headline: "Challenges and Resilience in U.S. Elections." Photo of presenter Barry Burden, a man with glasses and a beard, smiling. Text reads: Presenter: Barry Burden, Professor of Political Science, Director of the Elections Research Center, and the Lyons Family Chair in Electoral Politics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Host: Department of Political Science & Public Policy. Time: Thursday, Oct. 1, 2026, 6 p.m. Location: Minard 230. Description: The 2026 midterm elections are again testing election infrastructure in the United States. Election administration has weathered serious threats in recent years, testing the fortitude of the practices and systems essential for democracy to succeed. This talk identifies the challenges unique to this year's election cycle and assesses the readiness of government officials, stakeholders, and the public to respond. NDSU Political Science and Public Policy logo at bottom.
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 10/09/2026
NSF cactus is sad.
A sort of janky cactus growing out of an mug with the NSF logo on it.
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Per Engzell @pengzell.bsky.social · 28/11/2025
A thread of directed acyclic graphs (DAGs) that look like record covers... because that's EXACTLY what the world needs 1. Huey Lewis and the News: link.springer.com/chapter/10.1...
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 26/08/2026
On top of everything, the GFRP stipend was $30k in 2024 (so ~$54k in current dollars). Now it is $37k.
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 11/07/2026
But also, I didn't realize this until I moved to Fargo: www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-...
smithsonianmag.com
Why Don't We See Fireflies in the Western U.S.?
You asked, we answered
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Tim Longman 🏳️‍🌈 @timlongman.bsky.social · 08/07/2026
The Department of Education has now officially submitted proposals to eliminate International Education and Fulbright Hays programs, which have funded thousands of students and scholars to study languages and conduct research abroad. I encourage you to make public comments and contact your reps.
govinfo.gov
GovInfo
Official Publications from the U.S. Government Publishing Office.
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 04/07/2026
Beyond the disruption, it changes the equilibrium going forward, almost no matter what the next four years look like, because we all know it can be turned upside down on a dime. Eg, the political/institutional change necessary to make being an NSF rotator attractive again is massive.
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 29/06/2026
Norwegian Americans in the wild.
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 11/06/2026
I'm thoroughly jaded about this world cup, but the Mexican anthem at Azteca has me wobbling a bit.
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 10/06/2026
Pretty delighted with how Fargo voted for mayor (bonus that he's an NSDU polisci grad): www.facebook.com/share/v/1DBC...
Shot from the video described by this caption: Tonight, newly elected Mayor Joshua Boschee of Fargo, ND came over to visit Dempsey's Public House & Sang Chappell Roan's "Pink Pony Club" for Karaoke Night.
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Svend-Erik Skaaning @skaaning.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
New book on democracy. #OpenAccess Seven Myths about Democracy by Jørgen Møller & Svend-Erik Skaaning, Routledge taylorfrancis.com/books/oa-mon.... Challenges (full or partial) misunderstandings about the meaning, trajectory, causes, and consequences of democracy.
taylorfrancis.com
Seven Myths about Democracy | Jørgen Møller, Svend-Erik Skaaning | Tay
This timely book challenges seven widespread misconceptions about democracy that continue to shape public and academic debates about its past, present, and
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Politics & Gender @politicsgenderj.bsky.social · 26/05/2026
📣 New #FirstView Notes from the Field 📝 In "USAID Bureau on Democracy, Human Rights, and Governance", @mlkrook.bsky.social interviews Julie Denham, Rebecca Gordon, and other members of the gender team at DRG. buff.ly/r1Kh24W #OpenAccess gendersky polisky
Notes from the field article titled "USAID Bureau on Democracy, Human Rights, and Governance" by Julie Denham, Rebecca Gordon, Caroline Hubbard, Meg McClure, Alessia Stewart, and Mona Lena Krook.
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John Muller @johnspacemuller.com · 24/05/2026
Data visualization is my passion
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Alex Hanna @alexhanna.bsky.social · 21/05/2026
Matt Scherer on what I've been telling journalists for some time now: one of the biggest AI harms that we are staring down is the popping of the AI bubble, and the attentive harms we'll be seeing for working class folks. lpeproject.org/blog/the-rea...
In fact, the true risk to millions of Americans’ jobs comes not from AI-driven automation but from the economic bubble inflated by AI hype. The U.S. economy has become an enormous unhedged bet on rapid AI transformation. The eight most valuable U.S. companies, which together account for nearly 40% of the S&P 500’s total value, are all tech companies deeply invested in and exposed to the AI bubble. The stock market is more concentrated at the top than it has been since at least the 1920s, more concentrated in a single sector than it has been since the turn of the 20th century, and larger relative to the total economy than it has ever been. With more Americans invested in the stock market than ever before, an AI-driven stock market crash would do immense damage.
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Julia Azari @juliaazari.bsky.social · 04/05/2026
My Callais take: we should view the politics behind this decision through the "colorblind" lens - a backlash frame palatable to normal people. open.substack.com/pub/goodpoli...
open.substack.com
Colorblind politics have undermined civil rights for decades. Callais is just the latest.
The Voting Rights Act acknowledged what needed to happen for American democracy to flourish.
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Dr. Damien P. Williams, dread portent down from a mountain cave @wolven.blacksky.app · 02/05/2026
This is one of the most quietly revolutionary things any city can do to improve kids' lives & outcomes. If you genuinely care about kids having access to education or safe after school spaces & activities, then fund your libraries, staff your libraries, & make every public school ID a library card.
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RightsCon @rightscon.org · 01/05/2026
Following our April 29 announcement, we believe it's important to be transparent about the context that led to the decision. We want to explain, where we can, why this was made on such short notice, only days before we were set to host RightsCon. Read: www.rightscon.org/rc26-stateme...
rightscon.org
A statement to our community about why RightsCon 2026 will not take place in Zambia
Our official statement to the digital rights community about why RightsCon 2026 will not take place in Zambia
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Xavier Marquez @marquezxavier.bsky.social · 21/04/2026
New version of my R package {democracyData} available: github.com/xmarquez/dem...
github.com
GitHub - xmarquez/democracyData: Access and manipulate most standard scholarly measures of democracy
Access and manipulate most standard scholarly measures of democracy - xmarquez/democracyData
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John Muller @johnspacemuller.com · 20/04/2026
Harry Kane has put together a Ballon D'Or-caliber season while playing 771 games of online chess and improving his rapid rating by 280 points His Bayern teammate Michael Olise, second in the BDO odds, has played 854 games and improved by 344 points Their accounts have never played each other
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 20/04/2026
Very helpful. I'm still struggling with alt text on data visualizations for teaching. Sometimes the graph is there to explain something but often it is for practice drawing inferences from data. And then it feels like you need to exhaustively describe the figure, which quickly gets absurd.
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Bethany Albertson @albertsonb2.bsky.social · 20/04/2026
Gifting this article bc I learned things from it - it’s not good news. www.nytimes.com/2026/04/18/o...
nytimes.com
Opinion | Why the Stock Market Makes No Sense Right Now
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Steven Rich @datab.ae · 20/04/2026
i don’t ask for much but i’d really like ssx tricky to be available to play on any modern console pls and ty
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 14/04/2026
My dad died a few weeks ago. He was a good dad and funny and interesting and lived a remarkable life. He was a journalist, and, as a result, his friends tend to write wonderfully. I want to share this delightful remembrance by his friend John Jeansonne:
substack.com
Farewell to a friend
Ron Pemstein was a journalism star
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Becky Lomax @beckyjlomax.bsky.social · 11/04/2026
Sunrise at a backcountry camp. Isle Royale National Park #new #blueskyartshow #nationalparks #sunrise #Saturdaysunrise
The sun shoot oranges and pinks across the clouds and water with a line of vivid white-orange in the middle of the lake. Foreground is a rock slab with pools on it.
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Dan Pemstein @danpemstein.com · 11/04/2026
Whenever someone complains about roundabouts I suggest that at least we don't follow 1970s Yugoslav traffic laws, and they look at me funny and generally find someone else to talk to.
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Ethan Boldt @eboldtprof.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
Contrary to our expectations, Trump's appointees were not distinct from the other judges of the D.D.C. However, we find that Biden's appointed judges in the district were consistently more lenient than those of other presidents (Trump, Obama, Bush II, Clinton, & Reagan) across multiple models.
Effects of appointing president relative to a Trump-appointed judge on January 6 defendant's probability of receiving imprisonment. Biden-appointed judges were significantly less likely to incarcerate than their colleagues.Effects of appointing president relative to a Trump-appointed judge on January 6 defendant's sentence length. Biden-appointed judges gave significantly shorter prison sentences than their colleagues.
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Ethan Boldt @eboldtprof.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
Our forthcoming article in PRQ explores partisan and individual presidential appointment effects on the sentencing of those who attacked the US Capitol on January 6. We find: There were no partisan differences between Republican and Democratic judges in length or probability of imprisonment. And...
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Rachel Bachman, WSJ sports reporter @realbachscore.bsky.social · 29/03/2026
After Claudia Goldin became the first woman to win a solo Nobel in economics, she got hundreds of invitations. She accepted three. One was advising WNBA players on a labor deal. She helped players land the biggest % raise in US sports history. www.wsj.com/economy/wnba...
wsj.com
WNBA Players Had an Ace Up Their Sleeve in Pay Negotiations: A Nobel Laureate
Harvard economist Claudia Goldin helped WNBA players win a nearly 400% raise. Starting this season, players’ average salary will top $580,000.
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Kyle Marquardt @kailmarkvart.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
Very interesting reflections on interpreting trends in V-Dem data for a specific country (Mongolia) from an expert on that country.
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V-Dem Institute @vdeminstitute.bsky.social · 04/03/2026
💡 How does V-Dem assess the levels of democracy in a country? Watch the video or read the thread below to find out! 🧵1(7) #VDemMethodology #VDemData #Polisky #PolDataSky #SocialScienceData #PoliSciSky @vdemamlat.bsky.social @digitalsocietyproject.org
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V-Dem Institute @vdeminstitute.bsky.social · 05/03/2026
📢 We are hiring: Combined Postdoc position at V-Dem Institute and GLD! Applications are open for a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Cross-National Survey Methodology in Political Science. Application: web103.reachmee.com/ext/I005/103... 🧵1(4) #Polisky #PoliSciSky #PoliticalScienceJobs #PostDoc
Flag of University of Gothenburg, hanging from the wall of the Department of Political Science building. Added text: We're Hiring! Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Cross-National Survey Methodology in Political Science. Combined position at V-Dem Institute and Governance and Local Development Institute.
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Yana Gorokhovskaia @ygorokho.bsky.social · 19/03/2026
📣Freedom in the World 2026 is now out! freedomhouse.org/report/freed... tl;dr: - Global freedom declined in 2025 & every year since 2005 - 20 yrs of backsliding has transformed the world: more autocrats, fewer democratizing states - Freedom deteriorated in the US last year & over the last 20
freedomhouse.org
The Growing Shadow of Autocracy
Global freedom declined for the 20th consecutive year in 2025. But even in this especially challenging moment, there are reasons for optimism.
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Bastian Herre @bastianherre.bsky.social · 18/03/2026
However, with still largely free and fair elections, broad freedoms of expression and association, and a very strong civil society, the country has the potential to continue confronting the ongoing autocratization through voting, protesting, and broader organizing and advocacy.
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Kyle Marquardt @kailmarkvart.bsky.social · 18/03/2026
A 🧵on how the @vdeminstitute.bsky.social accountability indices help us understand how democratic backsliding is occurring in the United States. tl;dr: in principle, vertical constraints on the president remain strong; in practice, horizontal and diagonal constraints have been greatly weakened.
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Jason Concepcion @netw3rk.bsky.social · 18/03/2026
I will do anything, use any VPN, crawl through any shady pirate site, to not have to watch Alexi Lalas call the World Cup.
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Juraj Medzihorsky @medzihorsky.bsky.social · 17/03/2026
Social scientists' AI takes on social media, a first pseudo-weberian sketch with four ideal types.
A sketch of a 2 dimensional space. The vertical dimension spans from Spirituality (top) to Materiality (bottom). The horizontal dimension spans from Skepticism (left) to Enthusiasm (right). The four corners are labeled with quotes (that are entirely fictitious):
Top left: "We have sinned with neoliberalism and this is our punishment"
Top right: "We must prostrate ourselves and let AI into our hearths, for only then we can be saved"
Bottom left: "No way I'm picking up this tab, I neither ordered nor ate any of that"
Bottom right: "Moar faster commodity articles, science printer go brrrrrr, heck yeah"
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Digital Society Project @digitalsocietyproject.org · 17/03/2026
As usual, this year's V-Dem update includes an annual update to the original DSP expert survey.
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eric gonzalez juenke @egojunk.bsky.social · 17/03/2026
Yes, particularly a decline. Takes 2 minutes. And always suggest 2-3 other reviewers. It speeds things up like you can’t imagine.
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V-Dem Institute @vdeminstitute.bsky.social · 17/03/2026
V-Dem Dataset v16 is out! The dataset includes several hundred indicators along with five indices that measure a country’s overall degree of democracy, according to different definitions of democracy. V-Dem Steering Committee comments on the new data and U.S. ratings: v-dem.net/release-stat... 1(2)
A graph showing a comparison of V-Dem's Electoral Democracy index scores in 2015 and 2025. The graph shows that there are many more countries that have lower scores in 2025 compared to 2015 than there are countries with higher scores. The graph also shows that most countries are about as democratic in 2025 as they were in 2015.
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