11 Huge Elections Happening Besides America’s In 2024

2024 is a high-stakes year for democracy ― and we’re not just talking about the United States. It’s possible that over 4 billion people among dozens of countries could have the chance to cast a vote this year. Whether all those elections are free and fair is a different question.

“We’re very concerned about the quality of democracy around the world. There’s been a number of countries where things are moving not in the right direction, including in the U.S.,” David Carroll, director of the Carter Center’s Democracy Program, which oversees election monitoring around the world, told HuffPost.

While many people around the world are paying close attention to a possible rematch between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, HuffPost spoke to experts to learn more about the world elections that Americans should keep an eye on. The list is long, but here are 11 elections to get you started.

The Taiwanese people went to the polls Saturday for presidential and legislative elections that will be closely watched by both the U.S., one of Taiwan’s biggest supporters on the world stage, and China, which poses a threat but is also the self-governing island’s largest trading partner.

“The biggest irritant in U.S.-China relations across the decades has been Taiwan,” said Andrew Scobell, a distinguished fellow with the China program at the U.S. Institute of Peace. “And in essence, Taiwan is ground zero in U.S.-China competition, the most likely location and spark of a possible conflict between between the U.S. and China.”

Chinese President Xi Jinping late last month called Taiwan’s reunification with China “an inevitable course of development” that is popular with the people.

Tensions appeared to be high ahead of the race. Taiwan accused China of flying spy balloons over the island, a practice that they described as psychological warfare, and claimed Beijing was trying to interfere in the vote.

Taiwanese Vice President Lai Ching-te, who China opposes, is leading in the polls to succeed President Tsai Ing-wen, who is barred from seeking reelection due to term limits.

Lai, who leads the Democratic Progressive Party’s ticket, supports maintaining the status quo, while his main opponent, Hou Yu-ih of the Nationalist Party, is seen as having closer ties to Beijing. Taiwan People’s Party candidate Ko Wen-je, who Bloomberg has called “the wild card” of the race, has reportedly argued that he is the only choice that both China and the U.S. could live with, according to The Associated Press.

Scobell told HuffPost he doesn’t expect a major shift in Taiwan’s foreign policy, no matter which candidate wins.

“What matters more is the perception in Beijing,” he said. “And that’s different.”

Scobell explained that Xi appears to believe a Lai victory would move Taiwan “further down the road to de facto and de jure independence,” and therefore his win could eventually trigger a response from Beijing.

The U.S. has been quiet on the democratic decline in the world’s fifth most populous country. Now Pakistan is meant to be holding elections that have been widely criticized as neither free nor fair — if they even happen at all.

The most popular candidate, legendary cricket player and former Prime Minister Imran Khan, has been jailed on corruption charges, and his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party has been “decimated under intense pressure from the establishment,” Madiha Afzal, foreign policy fellow at the Brookings Institution, told HuffPost in an email. Khan was ousted by military powers who backed him for office and then turned on him.

Another former prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, has returned to the country after living in exile in London due to corruption charges. He now appears to be the candidate favored by the country’s military establishment.

The run-up to the election has been rife with legal battles, protests, violence and armed attacks on campaigners. Carroll, of the Carter Center, said it would be too difficult to get enough election observers on the ground there to be effective, due to the security situation.

“The conduct of election day and the outcome is hugely significant,” Afzal said. “It will determine whether there’s anything to be salvaged from what remains of Pakistan’s democracy, or whether its current democratic experiment is effectively over.”

The Biden administration’s response will also be notable. “If Sharif does win, and Biden does call, that will open up him up to…