Analysis: This year saw divisions on democracy, vaccines and climate. 2022 is unlikely to be an oasis of calm

The two events were suitable bookends for a year filled with turmoil and polarization — and not just in the United States.In between them came the humiliating and chaotic end of America’s democratic experiment in Afghanistan.In 1947, Winston Churchill famously noted: “It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except for all those other forms that have been tried.” In 2021, its example as the model to which nations should aspire was buffeted and beaten.The last 12 months were also the year of vaccines, as the world hoped to escape theThe democratic process held and the result of the 2020 election was certified. But the rejection of an indisputable result by a furious minority, mutterings about martial law and the deployment of 20,000 National Guard members for Biden’s inauguration were an unprecedented shock to the system. The events of that day were emblematic of toxic divisions in the United States.Even before the election, Biden — as the Democrats’ presidential candidate — China, which denies rights abuses in Xinjiang, also intensified its ideological attacks on the West — advancing a new sort of international order as trust in democracy faltered.As China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi Booster shots are being offered by the tens of millions in the US and Europe. But Facebook’s internal documents showed it was unprepared to deal with the “Stop the Steal” movement that led to the events of January 6. One of those documents captured the dilemma: “It was very difficult to know whether what we were seeing was a coordinated effort to delegitimize the election, or whether it was protected free expression by users who were afraid and confused and deserved our empathy.” Such is the reach of social media — Facebook alone has 3.9 billion users — that the first efforts at regulating Big Tech in Europe and the US have only now come to the fore.In the US, legislation has been floated that would end platforms’ immunity from prosecution where they “knowingly or recklessly” promote harmful content.Which leaves us…2021 has set the stage for struggles that will persist into the New Year and far beyond.The US’ polarization was not cauterized by President Donald Trump’s departure. Instead, it has rumbled on, showing “how easily shameless partisans can undermine public trust in long-standing institutions,” according to Yasha Mounk in Foreign Affairs. Democracies will have to compete with their adversaries in the marketplace of ideas, while attempting to cooperate on issues such as climate change, terrorism, cyber-security and health (ahead of the next pandemic).And we will be trying to put coronavirus behind us while grappling with its economic, social and psychological aftermath.Don’t expect 2022 to be an oasis of calm.