State and Future of Democracy in Bangladesh is a new annual conference hosted by the BRAC Institute of Governance and Development (BIGD), BRAC University. This year, the conference reflected on where the country’s democracy stands: how far it has come and how far it still has to go. The conference brought a wide-angle, academic, and analytical lens to the state and future of democracy in Bangladesh, situated within a historicized global perspective. This year, the focus was on the Return of Electoral Democracy in Bangladesh: Reflections and Learnings.
The inaugural edition was built around a simple premise: that the return of the ballot is a beginning rather than a destination, and that understanding what electoral democracy has recovered—and what it has yet to secure—asks for reflection as much as celebration. Across the day’s sessions, researchers from many different institutions—including IFPRI-Bangladesh, the University of Dhaka, Netra News, Pennsylvania State University, the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex, Dacca Institute of Research and Analytics, and BIGD—drew on their own research and field experience to examine where the transition stands, what it has made possible, and what it will take to deepen and sustain it.
