Is it with hope or despair that we embark on 2024?

When the Queen of Denmark, HM Margrethe II, said goodbye to 2023 in her annual New Year's speech and announced that it was not only the end of the year but also the end of her reign, she marked a dividing line in Danish history. 

After 52 years as Queen of Denmark, she is passing the torch (or sceptre) to the next generation. In many ways, it was a different world HM entered than the one she is passing on to her son. Still, many of the dividing lines that we as Danes, Europeans, and global citizens will face in the future are unsettlingly familiar. In many ways, 2023 was a year of revitalization for old fronts, and the world's people were faced with some difficult decisions. Between freedom and autocracy. East or west. Peace or war. Climate action or irresponsibility. 

We have to go back to before the fall of the Berlin Wall to find a time when fewer countries were democratic than today, and 2023 was also a democratic annus horribilis. 

Before the storms hit, Denmark sent waves of water from the lifeless fjords over Denmark, it was a wave of military coups that washed over the African continent. In Mali, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Gabon, Niger, and Sudan, it was not the National Guard that moved in with sandbags, but the military that moved into government buildings while democracy was put on hold. In terms of popular support for the military, the departure of ineffective governments and the end of French post-colonialism w more important than the democratic elections. The Danish Queen ascended to the throne in 1972, shortly after Africa's independence movement of the 1960s. Back then, the military was critical in the struggle against colonial powers. Whether this wave will lead to more sustainable democracies than was the case in the 1960s is, unfortunately, highly doubtful. 

The military also gave the Thai people a brief pause for thought when it, along with conservative forces, refused to hand over power to the country's new opposition party, Phak Kao Klai (Move Forward Party), which surprised everyone by winning the most seats in the Thai elections in May. However, after three months of chaotic arm-twisting, another coalition was able to secure both a majority and the power to form a new government without the people's preferred party. 

In 2023, Russia's military went into overdrive. Not only did Putin continue his brutal invasion of Ukraine, which has resulted in the tragic loss of over 200,000 lives, but the Russian military was also deployed as peacekeepers in the Nagorno-Karabakh region, a conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia. Russian mercenaries increased their activity throughout Africa, and Russian flags were raised following several West African coups. The West's influence is also shifting in Africa. 

Just when we thought things could not get any worse, the situation in Gaza erupted with unprecedented intensity on October 7th, when Hamas launched a ruthless terrorist attack. So far, Israel's response has killed over 15,000 civilians in Gaza, many of whom are children. Regardless of whether one sympathises with the Israeli or Palestinian cause, these are dreadful, unfathomable numbers. 

Hope or despair? The starting point is, at the very least, questionable as the world enters the largest election year in history. More than half of the world's population—4,200,000,000 people—lives in countries that will hold elections in 2024. These include major powers like India, Pakistan, Indonesia, and Russia. This, by itself, offers hope for change, at least in some countries. 

The most suspense (and fear) surrounds the United States presidential election on November 5, 2024. The choice is likely between the oldest president in US history and a vengeful autocrat. Democrats around the world hope to see Trumpism defeated once more. If not, the United States and the West will face an uncertain future. 

Argentina did not experience such uncertainty when Javier Milei, the "Trump of the Pampas," stormed to victory in December armed with a chainsaw. Symbolic of our time, his victory was preceded by a rejection of a failed political system. What he accomplishes with this victory remains to be seen. 

If there is any hope for 2023, one can look to Poland, a European great power. After eight years of gradual but steady erosion of the country's democracy, the Polish people voted out the Law and Justice party in favour of the former European Council president Donald Tusk's new government. It will take time to get the country back on track, but the importance of a democratic Poland cannot be overstated. Primarily for Polish citizens, but also for the future of European democracy. 

This hope should inspire Europeans as they vote in the European Parliament elections in June 2024. Rather than destabilising democracy in countries such as Poland, Hungary, and Serbia, we should hope that the EP election sends a signal of increased integration, cooperation, and democracy within the European Union. 

DIPD, in collaboration with the Danish political parties, has launched new partnerships in several countries aspiring to EU membership. In Georgia, the Danish Social Liberal Party is working with the Eastern European Centre for Multiparty Democracy to strengthen the institutional capacity of political parties. In North Macedonia, the Danish Liberal Party, the Social Democratic Party, and the Green Left are collaborating with like-minded parties on local political organisation and the development of green policies. Similar engagements are growing in places like Montenegro, Serbia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. Meaningful partnerships between democracies within and on the outskirts of Europe. 

This engagement demonstrates the strength of international democratic collaboration. It offers hope that democracy, despite resistance and setbacks, will once again prevail. 

A united Western alliance's support and engagement are critical to the success of Ukraine's freedom struggle, Taiwan's ability to withstand growing political pressure from Beijing, and the triumph of Myanmar's democratic movement. For democratic parties and civil societies around the world to protect democracy and human rights while demanding freedom and justice. 

It is my wish that 2024 will be a year of hope and action. The year in which the world's populations take the initiative and choose freedom over fear. And where global governments take responsibility for climate change and conflict. 

We should be able to deliver a better world when the time comes for H.M. King Frederik X to pass on the sceptre.