From Trump to Duterte: How Covid-19 is spelling end of so-called autocrats

Donald Trump in the United States, Viktor Orbán in Hungary, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, and others were seen as taking advantage of the crisis to advance their me-first agendas

The outbreak of COVID-19 initially looked like a gift to autocrats around the world. What better pretext for a state of emergency than a pandemic?

It was a golden opportunity to close borders, suppress civil society, and issue decrees left and right (mostly right). Donald Trump in the United States, Viktor Orbán in Hungary, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, and others took advantage of the crisis to advance their me-first agendas and consolidate power. Best of all, they could count on the fear of infection to keep protestors off the streets.

However, as the global death toll approaches a million