"Experts React: The 2021 Summit for Democracy," 16 Dec. 2021

The Biden administration achieved at least two of its goals at the Summit for Democracy: it sounded the alarm on the state of global democracy, which has suffered precipitous declines over the last 15 years, and it signaled that there is a global audience interested in discussing strategies to tackle this decline.

... Only the United States announced significant new policy initiatives and funding streams at the summit, with most other participants reserving any potential announcements for the upcoming “year of action.”

... [The United States] should more proactively and consistently engage civil society organizations—ideally integrating them into the summit follow-up process directly rather than in a parallel and less meaningful track—and work with them to both monitor current summit commitments and develop additional deliverables for the second summit in 2022.

... And the United States should acknowledge the impacts of the private sector on democracy—positive and negative—and bring companies and investors into the summit process directly, including calling on them to make their own specific commitments in areas such as economic inequality, protection for human rights defenders, and the impact of technology on democracy and human rights. With the single largest U.S. deliverable being a $122 million effort to protect worker rights globally, the lack of discussion—much less deliverables—by the private sector on this or related subjects at the summit was both conspicuous and inexplicable.