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Source link An election is a tool for political power, but its existence does not guarantee democracy. True democracy requires genuine political choice, free competition, and the ability for citizens to hold leaders accountable and remove them from power. A comparison of the United States and Ethiopia reveals how electoral systems and political contexts determine whether elections strengthen or undermine democratic governance.
In the United States, elections function within a system of separated powers. The president leads the executive, while Congress controls legislation and oversight. Midterm elections every two years allow voters to reshape Congress, checking executive authority even when the president remains in office. The 2026 midterms exemplify this: President Donald Trump stayed in power, but Democrats won control of both the House and Senate. This shift enabled legislative investigation, obstruction, and accountability, demonstrating that political power is not fixed and that voters can enforce consequences at the ballot box. While the U.S. system faces issues like gerrymandering and campaign finance disparities, its institutions permit real political turnover and peaceful power shifts.
Ethiopia presents a contrasting case. The country holds regular elections and maintains a multi-party constitution, but these have increasingly failed to produce meaningful competition. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed rose to power not through direct popular vote, but via internal party selection and parliamentary appointment after his predecessor’s resignation. His ascent sparked hopes of reform, but subsequent years saw centralization, especially after the 2019 creation of the Prosperity Party and the 2020 Tigray war. The 2021 and 2026 national elections were marked by significant restrictions: opposition boycotts, detained political figures, intimidation, and the complete exclusion of Tigray from voting. While the Prosperity Party won overwhelming majorities, critics argue these results reflect a constrained playing field rather than broad public mandate. International observers’ reports have been doubted due to governmental ties. Additionally, independent media has faced repression, such as the 2026 suspension of The Reporter newspaper, further limiting the public’s right to information and accountability.
The core difference lies in whether elections serve as a genuine check on power. In the U.S., institutional mechanisms allow the opposition to win legislative control and challenge the executive, reflecting a system where ruling parties can lose power. In Ethiopia, despite formal elections, opposition parties face severe barriers to organizing, campaigning, and winning, and peaceful transitions of power remain unlikely. Democracy is not merely about counting votes or announcing results; it requires an environment where citizens can vote freely, opposition can compete fairly, and institutions remain independent of executive dominance.
Ultimately, the question is whether citizens have real power to change their leaders. The U.S. midterms show that political power can shift without waiting for a presidential cycle. Ethiopia’s experience reveals that holding elections alone does not create democracy—without freedom from repression, genuine competition, and accountable institutions, elections risk becoming tools of consolidation rather than empowerment. True democracy means no party or individual owns the state, and the ballot remains a tool for the people to decide political direction.
