The Hong Kong and Moscow Protests: In Authoritarian Places, a Yearning for Democracy

History has its rhythms that can produce extraordinary moments — like the present one. At a time when attachment to democracy is waning in the world’s oldest and greatest democracies like the U.S. and the U.K., the yearning for it emerges in highly undemocratic places like Hong Kong and Moscow.

What a juxtaposition: While U.S. president Donald Trump continues undermining democratic norms (too many to count) and last week British prime minister Boris Johnson made the undemocratic move of…