1 Gene, 1 Disease No More – Acknowledging The Full Complexity Of Genetics Could Improve And Personalize Medicine

A whole lot more than just one genetic mutation determines whether and how disease develops. lvcandy/DigitalVision Vectors via Getty Images

BY SANTHOSH GIRIRAJAN

PROFESSOR OF BIOCHEMISTRY,

MOLECULAR BIOLOGY AND GENOMICS,

PENN STATE

Genetic inheritance may sound straightforward: One gene causes one trait or a specific illness. When doctors use genetics, it’s usually to try to identify a disease-causing gene to help guide diagnosis and treatment. But for most health conditions, the genetics is far more complicated than how clinicians are currently looking at it in diagnosis, counseling and treatment.

Your DNA carries millions of genetic variants you inherit from your parents or develop by chance. Some are common variants, shared by many people. Others are rare variants, found in very few people or even unique to a family. Together, these variants shape who you are – from visible traits such as height or eye color to health conditions such as diabetes or heart disease.

In our newly published research in the journal Cell, my team and I found that a genetic mutation involved in neurodevelopmental and psychiatric conditions such as autism and schizophrenia is affected by multiple other genetic variants, changing how these conditions develop. Our findings support the idea that, rather than focusing on single genes, taking the whole genome into account would provide insight into how researchers understand what makes someone genetically predisposed to certain diseases and how those diseases develop.

Primary and secondary variants

Certain rare variants can cause problems on their own, such as the genetic mutations that cause sickle cell anemia and cystic fibrosis. But in many cases, whether someone actually develops symptoms of disease depends on what else is happening across the genome.

While a primary variant might trigger a disease, secondary variants can alter how that disease develops and progresses. Think of it like a song: The melody (primary variant) is the main part of the song, but the bassist and drummer (secondary variants) can change its groove and rhythm.

That’s why two people with the same genetic mutation can seem so different. One person might have severe symptoms, another person mild symptoms, and another none at all. These variations can even occur within the same family. This phenomenon, called variable expressivity, arises from differences in the secondary variants a person has. In most cases, these variants amplify the effects of the primary mutation. A higher number of secondary variants on top of a primary variant generally leads to more severe disease.

Sometimes, a primary variant and a secondary variant together can cause two different disorders in the same person, such as Prader-Willi syndrome and Pitt-Hopkins syndrome. Other times, secondary variants have no obvious effect on their own but together can tip the balance of whether and how a disease will appear, even in the absence of a primary variant. This can be seen in the development of heart disease in children.

Insights from a missing piece of a chromosome

My team and I studied a genetic change known as a 16p12.1 deletion, where a small piece of chromosome 16 is missing. Researchers have linked this mutation to developmental delay, intellectual disability and psychiatric conditions such as schizophrenia. Yet most children inherit this genetic variant from a parent who has milder symptoms, different symptoms or sometimes no symptoms at all.

To understand why this happens, we analyzed 442 individuals from 124 families carrying this genetic mutation. We found that children lacking this piece of chromosome 16 had more secondary variants elsewhere in the genome compared to their carrier parents. These secondary variants took many forms, including both small changes and large deletions, duplications and expansions of their DNA.

Each type of secondary variant was associated with different health outcomes. Some were linked to smaller head size and reduced cognitive function, while others contributed to higher rates of psychiatric or developmental symptoms. This suggests that while a 16p12.1 deletion makes the genome more sensitive to neurodevelopmental disorders, which symptoms manifest depends on which other variants are present.

The story gets even more complex when considering the fact that children not only inherit a 16p12.1 deletion from one parent but also inherit secondary variants from both parents.

My team and I found that the symptoms of the parent with this genetic mutation often match those of their spouse. For example, a parent with a 16p12.1 deletion who shows signs of anxiety or depression is more likely to have a partner who also has these symptoms. This pattern, called assortative mating, means that when parents with overlapping genetic risks have children, those risks can combine and accumulate.

Over generations, this stacking of secondary variants can lead to children who have more severe symptoms than their parents.

Biases in genetics research

One reason why scientific understanding of secondary variants has lagged is that genetic research often depends on who is recruited to participate in these studies and how researchers recruit them.

Most studies recruit patients affected with a particular disease. Families recruited from genetic clinics typically have children with severe versions of the disease. But if studies focus only on patients with the most acute symptoms, researchers may overestimate the effects of primary variants and miss the subtler role that secondary variants may play in how a disease develops.

But if researchers were to study people drawn from the general population – say, by recruiting people from a large shopping mall – some might carry the same primary variant but have far milder symptoms or none at all. This variability allows researchers to better dissect how different parts of the genome interact with each other and affect how a disease develops.

In our study, for example, we found that people with a 16p12.1 deletion who were recruited from the general population often had milder symptoms and different patterns of secondary variants compared to those who were recruited in a clinic.

Embracing complexity in genetics

Instead of a deterministic view where one mutation equals one outcome, a more complex model accounts for the fact that whether and how a disease develops depends on the interplay between different genetic variants and environment. This has implications for how genetics is used in the clinic.

Currently, a child who tests positive for a genetic variant might be diagnosed with a disease tied to that mutation. In the future, doctors might also examine the child’s broader genetic profile to better predict their developmental trajectory, psychiatric risk or response to therapies. Families could be counseled with a more realistic picture of their child’s probability of developing a disease, rather than assuming every person with the same genetic variant will share the same outcome.

The science is still emerging. Larger and more diverse datasets and models that can better capture the subtle effects of genetic variants and environmental factors are still needed. But what’s clear is that secondary variants are not secondary in importance.

By embracing this complexity, I believe genetics can move closer to its ultimate promise: not just explaining why disease happens, but predicting who is most at risk and personalizing care for each individual.

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How Does Your Immune System Stay Balanced? A Nobel Prize-Winning Answer

Regulatory T cells (red) interact with other immune cells (blue) and modulate immune responses. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases/NIH via Flickr

BY AIMEE PUGH BERNARD

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF IMMUNILOGY

AND MICROBIOLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF

COLORADO ANSCHULZ MEDICAL CAMPUS

Every day, your immune system performs a delicate balancing act, defending you from thousands of pathogens that cause disease while sparing your body’s own healthy cells. This careful equilibrium is so seamless that most people don’t think about it until something goes wrong.

Autoimmune diseases such as Type 1 diabetes, lupus and rheumatoid arthritis are stark reminders of what happens when the immune system mistakes your own cells as threats it needs to attack. But how does your immune system distinguish between “self” and “nonself”?

The 2025 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine honors three scientists – Shimon Sakaguchi, Mary Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell – whose groundbreaking discoveries revealed how your immune system maintains this delicate balance. Their work on two key components of immune tolerance – regulatory T cells and the FOXP3 gene – transformed how researchers like me understand the immune system, opening new doors for treating autoimmune diseases and cancer.

How immune tolerance works

While the immune system is designed to recognize and eliminate foreign invaders such as viruses and bacteria, it must also avoid attacking the body’s own tissues. This concept is called self-tolerance.

For decades, scientists thought self-tolerance was primarily established in the parts of the body that make immune cells, such as the thymus for T cells and the bone marrow for B cells. There, newly created immune cells that attack “self” are eliminated during development through a process called central tolerance.

However, some of these self-reactive immune cells escape this process of elimination and are released into the rest of the body. Sakaguchi’s 1995 discovery of a new class of immune cells, called regulatory T cells, or Tregs, revealed another layer of protection: peripheral tolerance. These cells act as security guards of the immune system, patrolling the body and suppressing rogue immune responses that could lead to autoimmunity.

While Sakaguchi identified the cells, Brunkow and Ramsdell in 2001 uncovered the molecular key that controls them. They found that mutations in a gene called FOXP3 caused a fatal autoimmune disorder in mice. They later showed that similar mutations in humans lead to immune dysregulation and a rare and severe autoimmune disease called IPEX syndrome, short for immunodysregulation polyendocrinopathy enteropathy X-linked syndrome. This disease results from missing or malfunctioning regulatory T cells.

In 2003, Sakaguchi confirmed that FOXP3 is essential for the development of regulatory T cells. FOXP3 codes for a type of protein called a transcription factor, meaning it helps turn on the genes necessary for regulatory T cells to develop and function. Without this protein, these cells either don’t form or fail to suppress harmful immune responses.

Harnessing the immune system for medicine

Regulatory T cells can be heroes or villains, depending on the context. When regulatory T cells don’t work, it can lead to disease. A breakdown in immune tolerance can result in autoimmune diseases, where the immune system attacks healthy tissues. Conversely, in cancer, regulatory T cells can be too effective in suppressing immune responses that might otherwise destroy tumors.

Understanding how FOXP3 and regulatory T cells work launched a new era in immunotherapies that harness the immune system to treat autoimmune diseases and cancer. For autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and Type 1 diabetes, researchers are exploring ways to boost the function of Tregs. For cancer, the goal is to inhibit Tregs, allowing the immune system to target tumors more aggressively.

Beyond disease treatment, this research may also improve organ transplantation, where immune tolerance is crucial to prevent rejection. Scientists are exploring how to engineer or expand Tregs to help the body accept transplanted tissues over the long term.

Continuing to unlock the secrets of immune regulation can help lead to a future where the immune system can be precisely tuned like a thermostat – whether to turn it down in autoimmunity or rev it up against cancer.

The 2025 Nobel Prize reminds us that science, at its best, doesn’t just explain the world – it changes lives.

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View From The Hill: Two Years Of A Distant War Have Brought Much Damage To Australian Society

Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-CEO Alec Ryvchin (centre) joins protestors as the hold placards of Israeli hostages following a press conference marking the two-year anniversary of the Hamas terrorist attacks against Israel. Bianca De Marchi/AAP

BY MICHELLE GRATAN

PROFESSIONAL FELLOW,

UNIVERSITY OF CANBERRA

Two years ago, who would have imagined the police and the Palestine Action Group (PAG) would be fighting in court over whether demonstrators should be allowed to rally outside the Sydney Opera House?

Indeed, 24 months ago, who would have thought we’d have (or need) designated “envoys” to combat antisemitism and Islamophobia in Australia?

On Tuesday’s second anniversary of the Hamas atrocities in Israel, it is sobering to reflect how much damage this horrific Middle East conflict, which has cost tens of thousands of lives, most of them Palestinian, has done to Australia’s own society.

In Fitzroy in Melbourne, pro-Palestinian graffiti appeared to mark the anniversary: “Glory to Hamas”, “Oct 7, do it again”, “Glory to the martyrs”.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described this as “terrorist propaganda” that was “abhorrent,” saying those responsible “must face the full force of the law”.

On Wednesday, the issue of Sunday’s proposed protest outside the Opera House will be back in court. The police don’t want the protesters’ march to be allowed to end in the tight space at the Opera House, citing dangers to safety.

The lawyer for the PAG said on Tuesday: “If the police application is conceded to, the ramifications for the right to protest in Australia will not be confined to the Opera House, but for a wide variety of protest activities”. The group argues the issue is a constitutional one.

In the past two years, this faraway conflict has done substantial harm to Australia’s social cohesion, raised questions about the future of multiculturalism, and produced serious divisions about where lines should be drawn on limiting free speech and the right to protest. The response of institutions, universities in particular, has been tested and in some cases found wanting.

NSW Labor Premier Chris Minns gave a flavour of the cross pressures when speaking on Sydney radio on Tuesday.

“We’ve moved significant changes to hate speech laws in New South Wales and we’ve done it because we recognise we live in a multicultural community and yes, you’ve got a right to freedom of speech but someone else has a right not to be vilified or hated on the basis of their race or religion. All of those laws are currently being challenged in the High Court because of the implied freedom of political communication.”

As hope, however tentative, is glimmering that the peace plan advanced by United States President Donald Trump just might bring a real breakthrough in this terrible war, the fissures it has produced in Australia seem as sharp as ever.

In two years, the Australian Jewish community has been embattled, with attacks on synagogues and other Jewish places, and many individuals deeply frightened for their own and their families’ safety. Iran’s intervention, behind at least two attacks, sought to stoke division.

In that time, the determination of Palestinian supporters has been steadfast, with regular weekend demonstrations maintained throughout.

The conflict has fractured the Australia-Israel relationship, with the Albanese government increasingly critical of Israel’s unrelenting prosecution of the war, and the Netanyahu government turning on Australia.

This culminated with Australia’s recognition of a Palestinian state at the United Nations during the prime minister’s recent trip. The recognition was the end of Labor’s internal journey, which commenced many years before this war began.

The Greens Party have been at the left edge of the political spectrum.

The Australian community was divided about Palestinian recognition: an Essential poll published in late September showed 34% in favour, and 30% against.

The conflict has shattered what used to be a bipartisan Middle East policy, when both main parties strongly supported Israel and also backed a two-state solution for a long-term Middle East settlement.

Over the past two years, the Coalition has been strongly pro-Israel, accusing the Labor government of deserting an ally and failing to deal robustly with antisemitism in this country.

Opposition leader Sussan Ley used her parliamentary speech on Tuesday’s anniversary to home in on the government’s policy towards Israel.

“To our great shame, under the leadership of the Albanese Labor government, Australia has not stood with the people of Israel, nor with the United States, as they have sought to dismantle Hamas and establish the conditions for peace”.

The local rifts that have come to the surface in Australia were there well before October 7 2023. The war caused them to widen dramatically and explode.

Even if, and when, this conflict subsides, it will leave fractures, anger, bitterness and fear within sections of the Australian community.

Whatever healing takes place almost certainly won’t be complete. For governments, federal and state, intractable policy challenges will remain.

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Around The World, Migrants Are Being Deported At Alarming Rates – How Did This Become Normalised?

Image: Michael Gonzalez/Associated Press

BY ANDONEA JON DICKSON, CETA MAINWARING AND THOM TYERMAN

UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURG

Under President Donald Trump, the United States is expanding its efforts to detain and deport non-citizens at an alarming rate. In recent months, the Trump administration made deals with a number of third states to receive deported non-citizens.

In Australia, the Labor government has similarly established new powers to deport non-citizens to third states. The government signed a secretive deal with Nauru in September, guaranteeing the small Micronesian island A$2.5 billion over the next three decades to accommodate the first cohort of deportees.

In both countries, migrants can now be banished to states to which they have no prior connection.

Last year in the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour party promised that the previous Conservative government’s plan to deport people to Rwanda was “dead and buried”. Yet, Labour removed close to 35,000 people in 2024, an increase of 25% over the previous year.

Starmer has also proposed establishing “return hubs” in third countries for people with rejected asylum claims.

Meanwhile, the far-right Reform Party has put forward a “mass deportation” plan involving the use of military bases to detain and deport hundreds of thousands of people, if it wins power in the next general election.

Similar policies may soon come to Europe, too. In May, the European Commission published a proposal that would allow EU member states to deport people seeking asylum to third countries where they have no previous connection.

The deportation of populations deemed problematic is not a new practice. For centuries, states have used forms of deportation to forcibly remove people, as Australia’s own history as a British penal colony illustrates.

Today, deportations are a staple of migration governance around the world. However, the recent expansion of detention and deportations reflects an accelerated criminalisation and punishment of non-citizens, tied to a rising authoritarianism across purportedly liberal Western countries.

Criminalising movement

The expansion and outsourcing of deportation is underpinned by long histories of criminalising migration.

Over the past three decades, legal obstacles and securitised borders have increasingly forced those fleeing war, persecution and insecurity to rely on unauthorised routes to seek refuge.

Governments have simultaneously reframed the act of seeking asylum from a human right to a criminal act, brandishing those on the move as “illegal” as a way of justifying onshore and offshore immigration detention.

Racialised people living in the community have also been subject to increased policing, regardless of their migration status.

In the US, UK and Australia, this criminalising language, once the preserve of the right-wing press, is now echoed by politicians across the political spectrum and enshrined in legislation. This has accelerated what migration expert Alison Mountz has termed “the death of asylum”, and normalising deportations.

In Australia, for example, the government lowered the threshold for visa cancellations in 2014, resulting in people with minor offences being detained and scheduled for deportation. Those who could not be returned to their home countries continued to languish in detention until a 2023 high court ruling mandated their release.

Despite having served their sentences, in addition to protracted periods in immigration detention, a media frenzy framed these people as a major threat to the community. The Labor government then legislated to deport them, in addition to thousands of others on precarious visas, to a third country.

Deportations have also been a central facet of US immigration enforcement for many years.

Former President Barack Obama was branded “Deporter in Chief” for achieving a record three million deportations while in office.

While Obama focused on “felons not families”, Trump has equated migration itself with crime and insecurity. His administration has cast a much wider net, rounding up those with and without criminal convictions, including citizens.

Detentions and deportations have also been used to suppress political dissent on issues, such as the genocide in Gaza.

To expedite his pledge to deport one million people in his first year, the Trump administration hastily set up detention centres in former prisons and military bases, including at Guantánamo Bay.

Reports suggest the government has also approached 58 third countries to accept deported non-nationals. Countries that have agreed, or already received people, are shown in the map below.

In many cases, people are then re-detained on arrival in hotels, prisons and camps, with some subject to further deportation.

Rising authoritarianism

These recent developments reveal an explicit authoritarianism in which deportations are achieved through the elimination of procedural fairness. Reducing notice periods, the ability to appeal decisions, and access to legal counsel allows for rushed and opaque procedures.

In June, eight people were deported from the US to South Sudan without the chance to contest their removal. After a failed court intervention, the three liberal US Supreme Court justices stated:

The government has made clear in word and deed that it feels itself unconstrained by law, free to deport anyone, anywhere without notice or an opportunity to be heard.

In the UK, the Labour party expanded the “Deport Now Appeal Later” scheme in August, extending the countries to which people can be deported without appeal rights from eight to 23.

And this month in Australia, the Migration Act was amended to expunge the rules of natural justice for people scheduled for deportation.

Across all three countries, the rapid expansion of detention and deportation practices terrorise those targeted, leaving whole communities living in fear. Australian human rights lawyer Alison Battisson described deportation as “a creeping death to the individuals and their families”.

These policies have also legitimised and emboldened far-right, neo-Nazi groups, who have taken to the streets in both the UK and Australia in recent weeks calling for an end to migration. In both countries, the effects of decades of neoliberal policies, such as a lack of affordable housing, jobs, and health care, are redefined as a problem of migration.

How communities are responding

Communities are now organising and making the case for a different sort of politics.

In Los Angeles, for example, grassroots organisations mobilised earlier this year to counter escalating raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents. Networks also began providing information and support to those targeted by ICE arrests. In July, Detention Watch Network relaunched the Communities Not Cages coalition of grassroots campaigns against detention.

In the UK, far-right rallies at asylum hotels have been met by counter demonstrations, with people insisting on a politics of welcome and unity.

But the challenge remains how to turn local and national opposition into a coalition capable of confronting this rise in authoritarian politics of exclusion and expulsion.

US Economy Is Already On The Edge – A Prolonged Government Shutdown Could Send It Tumbling Over

Many parks, such as Florida’s Everglades National Park, were closed as a result of the shutdown. AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell

BY JOHN W. DIAMOND

DIRECTOR OF THE CENTER PUBLIC

FINANCE AT THE BAKER INSTITUTE,

RICE UNIVERSITY

The economic consequences of the current federal government shutdown hinge critically on how long it lasts. If it is resolved quickly, the costs will be small, but if it drags on, it could send the U.S. economy into a tailspin.

That’s because the economy is already in a precarious state, with the labor market struggling, consumers losing confidence and uncertainty mounting.

As an economist who studies public finance, I closely follow how government policies affect the economy. Let me explain how a prolonged shutdown could affect the economy – and why it could be a tipping point to recession.

Direct impacts from a government shutdown

The partial government shutdown began on Oct. 1, 2025, as Democrats and Republicans failed to reach a deal on funding some portion of the federal government. A partial shutdown means that some funding bills have been approved, entitlement spending continues since it does not rely on annual appropriations, and some workers are deemed necessary and stay on the job unpaid.

While most of the 20 shutdowns that occurred from 1976 through 2024 lasted only a few days to a week, there are signs the current one may not be resolved so quickly. The economy would definitely take a direct hit to gross domestic product from a lengthy shutdown, but it’s the indirect impacts that could be more harmful.

The most recent shutdown, which extended over the 2018-2019 winter holidays and lasted 35 days, was the longest in U.S. history. After it ended, the Congressional Budget Office estimated the partial shutdown delayed approximately US$18 billion in federal discretionary spending, which translated into an $11 billion reduction in real GDP.

Most of that lost output was made up later once the shutdown ended, the CBO noted. It estimated that the permanent losses were about $3 billion – a drop in the bucket for the $30 trillion U.S. economy.

The indirect and more lasting impacts

The full impact may depend to a large extent on the psychology of the average consumer.

Recent data suggests that consumer confidence is falling as the stagnation in the labor market becomes more clear. Business confidence has been mixed as the manufacturing index continues to indicate the sector is in contraction, while other business confidence measures indicate mixed expectations about the future.

If the shutdown drags on, the psychological effects may lead to a larger loss of confidence among consumers and businesses. Given that consumer spending accounts for 70% of economic activity, a fall in consumer confidence could signal a turning point in the economy.

These indirect effects are in addition to the direct impact of lost income for federal workers and those that operate on federal contracts, which leads to reductions in consumption and production.

The risk of significant government layoffs, beyond the usual furloughs, could deepen the economic damage. Extensive layoffs would shift the losses from a temporary delay to a more permanent loss of income and human capital, reducing aggregate demand and potentially increasing unemployment spillovers into the private sector.

In short, while shutdowns that end quickly tend to inflict modest, mostly recoverable losses, a protracted shutdown – especially one involving layoffs of a significant number of government workers – could inflict larger, lasting impacts on the economy.

US economy is already in distress

This is all occurring as the U.S. labor market is flashing warnings.

Payrolls grew by only 22,000 in August, with July and June estimates revised down by 21,000. This follows payroll growth of only 73,000 in July, with May and June estimates revised down by 258,000. In addition, preliminary annual revisions to the employment data show the economy gained 911,000 fewer jobs in the previous year than had been reported.

Long-term unemployment is also rising, with 1.8 million people out of work for more than 27 weeks – nearly a quarter of the total number of unemployed individuals.

At the same time, AI adoption and cost-cutting could further reduce labor demand, while an aging workforce and lower immigration shrink labor supply. Fed Chair Jerome Powell refers to this as a “curious kind of balance” in the labor market.

In other words, the job market appears to have come to a screeching halt, making it difficult for recent graduates to find work. Recent graduate unemployment – that is, those who are 22 to 27 years old – is now 5.3% relative to the total unemployment rate of 4.3%.

The latest data from the ADP employment report, which measures only private company data, shows that the economy lost 32,000 jobs in September. That’s the biggest decline in 2½ years. While that’s worrying, economists like me usually wait for the official Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers to come out to confirm the accuracy of the payroll processing firm’s report.

The government data that was supposed to come out on Oct. 3 might have offered a possible counterpoint to the bad ADP news, but due to the shutdown BLS will not be releasing the report.

Problems Fed rate cuts can’t fix

This will only increase the uncertainty surrounding the health of the U.S. economy. And it adds to the uncertainty created by on-again, off-again tariffs as well as the newly imposed tariffs on lumber, furniture and other goods.

Against this backdrop, the Fed is expected to lower interest rates at least two more times this year to stimulate consumer and business spending following its September quarter-point cut. This raises the risk of reigniting inflation, but the cooling labor market is a more immediate concern for the Fed.

While lower short-term rates may help at the margin, I believe they cannot resolve the deeper challenges, such as massive government deficits and debt, tight household budgets, a housing affordability crisis and a shrinking labor force.

The question now is not will the Fed cut rates, because it likely will, but whether that cut will help, particularly if the shutdown lasts weeks or more. Monetary policy alone cannot overcome the uncertainty created by tariffs, the lack of fiscal restraint, companies focused on cutting costs by replacing people with technology, the impact of the shutdown and the fears of consumers about the future.

Lower interest rates may buy time, but they won’t solve these structural problems facing the U.S. economy.

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One In Two Nigerians Live In Poverty: Why Relief Programmes Have Failed

A woman walks past tomato vendors at Mile 12 food market in Lagos, Nigeria. Pius Utomi Ekpei/AFP via Getty Images

BY MOYOSOLUWA DELE-GADA

ASSISTANT LECTURER,

COVENANT UNIVERSITY

Poverty in Nigeria has reached critical levels, recent data shows. About 31% of Nigerians lived in poverty prior to the COVID-19 epidemic. Since then, an additional 42 million have become poor, increasing the poverty rate to about 46% in 2024.

Over 133 million people are living in multidimensional poverty, despite government efforts to reduce hardship.

Multidimensional poverty means being deprived of wellbeing in several ways. It goes beyond income.

The national Multidimensional Poverty Index indicates that 67.5% of children in Nigeria aged 0-17 are poor. And half of all poor Nigerians – 51% – are children.

Over the years, successive governments have tried a number of things to reduce poverty.

The National Poverty Eradication Programme was established in 2001 and the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment Programme in 2012. The National Social Investment Programme was introduced in 2016.

Yet poverty levels have continued to rise. The question is why.

I am a political scientist whose research looks at the intersections of legislative oversight, poverty alleviation and conflict dynamics.

I recently conducted a study which examined why government poverty alleviation programmes in Nigeria have under-performed.

The study focused on the responsibility of lawmakers to hold governments accountable, and how this fits with Nigeria’s poverty alleviation agenda. It examined how poverty programmes are designed, implemented and evaluated.

The findings showed that poverty persists not because of a lack of programmes but because of governance failures. Three factors stood out: weak legislative accountability, political interference, and the absence of people-centred policy designs.

Three factors are responsible

1. Weak legislative accountability: Lawmakers are supposed to serve as a watchdog, ensuring that things get done. In practice, this oversight is often weak, underfunded, or compromised.

Parliamentary committees responsible for monitoring programmes frequently lack the resources, data and independence to scrutinise government actions. In many cases, legislators have limited incentives to challenge the executive, especially when they belong to the same ruling party. Consequently, government agencies can avoid accounting for what they do, or fail to do.

Many initiatives collapse shortly after their launch because no one is tracking whether goals are met. Anti-poverty programmes become symbolic gestures rather than vehicles of real change.

2. Political interference: Poverty alleviation in Nigeria is rarely separate from politics. Instead, programmes are designed and implemented with political objectives in mind, especially during election cycles.

Governments use these programmes to build loyalty or reward supporters. They expand patronage networks rather than addressing the roots of poverty. For example, appointments to programme boards or agencies are frequently based on political considerations, not technical expertise. Beneficiary lists are sometimes skewed towards ruling party loyalists rather than the poorest communities.

This political capture means that programmes are short-lived. Once a new administration takes office, it often abandons what the last one did. This leads to duplication, waste and discontinuity.

3. Absence of people-centred policy design: Perhaps the most striking finding is that many poverty relief policies are not designed with the poor at the centre. Instead, they are top-down strategies. They are distant from the everyday realities of poor communities.

These policies are about broad economic restructuring or macro-level reforms rather than immediate needs like food security, healthcare, local employment, or education access. Beneficiaries are rarely consulted in the design or monitoring of programmes.

When communities see poverty initiatives as irrelevant or inaccessible, it’s likely the targets will be missed.

What should be done

Understanding why poverty relief programmes fail is important because poverty in Nigeria is not simply an economic problem. It is a governance and accountability problem.

Unless the weaknesses in oversight, politics and policy design are addressed, new initiatives will likely fail too.

To change course, the National Assembly must take legislative oversight more seriously. It must consistently examine the evidence around government programmes. This requires adequate resourcing of its committees, and stronger collaboration with independent auditors. Committees must have enough support from researchers and experts.

Regular public reporting should hold agencies accountable for funds and outcomes.

Political interference must end. The presidency and parliament should work together to keep poverty alleviation agencies away from partisan control. This can be done by appointing professionals and community representatives to manage them. Anti-corruption bodies must take action when funds are diverted or programmes are captured by elite interests.

Poverty relief policies must be designed with citizens at the centre. Communities must be consulted before programmes are launched, and the experiences of beneficiaries must be captured.

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The 5 Big Problems With Trump’s Gaza Peace Plan

Israel launched scores of airstrikes on Gaza City last weekend as Trump foreshadowed a peace plan was on the way. Yousef Al Zanoun/AP

BY IAN PARMETER

RESEARCH SCHOLAR, MIDDLE EAST STUDIES, 

AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY

The 20-point plan announced by US President Donald Trump at a joint news conference with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu comes close to living up to Trump’s hype. It is a bold attempt to address all of the issues that need to be resolved if there is to be lasting peace in Gaza.

Could it work? Both sides are tired of the war. Throughout history, quite a number of wars have simply come to an end when both sides were too exhausted to continue. Two-thirds of Israelis want the war to end, and though polling of Palestinians is difficult, they clearly want the devastation and suffering in Gaza to stop, too.

So, this plan, despite its limitations, could come at the right time.

However, there are many outstanding questions about the feasibility of the plan and to what extent it is likely to be successful. Given the Middle East’s violent history, it’s impossible to be optimistic at this point.

Here are five main reasons for concern.

1. Trust is lacking

There’s zero trust between both sides right now. And several aspects of the plan are so vague, there is a big risk both sides could accuse the other of breaking their promises.

The last ceasefire between the two sides only lasted two months before Netanyahu backed out, blaming Hamas for not releasing more hostages before negotiations on the next phase could proceed.
2. The plan is asymmetrical

The deal favours Israel more than it does Hamas. Hamas is essentially being asked to give up all of the remaining Israeli hostages it holds and all of its weapons at the same time, rendering it entirely defenceless.

Hamas, with its lack of trust in Israel and Netanyahu, in particular, may fear the Israeli leader could use this as an opportunity to attack it again without worrying about harming the hostages.

Hamas was also not invited to negotiate the terms of the agreement. And it now faces an ultimatum: accept the terms or Israel will “finish the job”.

Given the asymmetry of the plan, Hamas may decide the risks of accepting it outweigh the potential benefits, despite its offer of amnesty for Hamas fighters who lay down their arms.

Israel is being asked to make some compromises in the plan. But how realistic are these?

For example, the deal envisions a future when the Palestinian Authority (PA) can “securely and effectively take back control of Gaza”. Netanyahu has previously said he would not accept this.

Likewise, it would also be very difficult for Netanyahu to accept “a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood”, as outlined in the plan. He has firmly rejected this in the past, most recently in his defiant address to the UN General Assembly last week.

3. Important details are lacking

The implementation strategy of the plan is extraordinarily vague. We know nothing at this stage about the “International Stabilisation Force” that would take the place of the Israeli military after it withdraws from Gaza.

Which countries would participate? It would obviously be a mission fraught with danger to the personnel involved. Netanyahu has previously mentioned an Arab force taking over in Gaza, but no Arab states have yet put their hands up for this.

There is also no timeframe in the plan for the Palestinian Authority reforms, nor any details on what these reforms would entail.

Presumably, there would need to be new elections to install a credible leader in place of current President Mahmoud Abbas. But how that would be done and whether the people of Gaza would be able to take part is still unknown.

In addition, the details of the civil authority that would oversee the reconstruction of Gaza are very unclear. All we know is that Trump would appoint himself chair of the “Board of Peace”, and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair would also somehow be involved.

This board would need the absolute confidence of the Netanyahu government and Hamas to be effective. Trust is always in short supply in the Middle East.

4. No mention of the West Bank

The West Bank is clearly a flashpoint. There are disputes and clashes every day between the Israeli settlers and Palestinian residents, which are only likely to get worse.

Just last month, the Israeli government gave final approval to a controversial plan to build a new settlement that would effectively divide the West Bank in two, making a future, contiguous Palestinian state unviable.

The West Bank must be central to any overall settlement between Israel and Palestine.

5. Israel’s right-wing cabinet remains an obstacle

This could be the ultimate deal breaker: the hardline right-wing members of Netanyahu’s cabinet, Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, have said they will not accept anything less than the complete destruction and elimination of Hamas.

And although Hamas would be disarmed and politically sidelined under this plan, its ideology would remain intact, as would a significant number of its fighters.

So, does it have a chance?

If Hamas accepts Trump’s plan, we could soon have the answers to several of these questions.

But it is going to require a great deal of work by the United States to maintain the pressure on Israel to stick to the deal. The chief Palestinian mediators, Qatar and Egypt, would also need to maintain pressure on Hamas so it doesn’t breach the conditions, as well.

Netanyahu is likely assuming there will be sufficient off-ramps for him to get out of the agreement if Hamas doesn’t live up to it. Netanyahu has already done this once when he backed out of the ceasefire in March and resumed Israel’s military operations.

In his forceful speech to a partially empty UN General Assembly hall last week, Netanyahu didn’t indicate he was thinking of walking away from any of the red lines he had previously set to end the war. In fact, he condemned the states recognising a Palestinian state and vowed, “Israel will not allow you to shove a terror state down our throats.”

Given this, Netanyahu would not have agreed to Trump’s plan at all if the US leader hadn’t put pressure on him. At the same time, Trump said at his news conference with Netanyahu that if Hamas fails to live up to the agreement or refuses to accept it, Israel would have his full backing to finish the job against Hamas.

This promise may be enough for Netanyahu to be able to persuade Smotrich and Ben-Gvir to support the plan – for now.

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You’re Likely Not As Immune To Scams As You Think – Here’s Why

The Conjurer, c. 1502. Workshop of Hieronymus Bosch

BY MAMELLO THINYANE

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, OPTUS CHAIR

OF CYBERSECURITY AND DATA SCIENCE

UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA

What do Tiger Woods, Ben Stiller, Australian pensioners and dating app users have in common? Despite being from different walks of life, they have all fallen prey to various scams.

In 2024, more than A$2.03 billion was lost to scams in Australia across 494,732 reported cases. Most of these scams were enabled by technology, with scammers contacting their victims either online or on the phone. However, about 600 of these scams happened in person.

All of us are vulnerable to being scammed – it’s rooted in who we are as human beings. If you think you’re immune, you are not. Police officers fall for scams. Even cyber security professionals fall for scams. So what hope is there for the rest of us?

What does help is to understand the underlying techniques online scammers rely on, so that you can better spot them. These psychological tactics are similar to those used in offline scams, street cons and social engineering in general. But they’re also reminiscent of techniques used in advertising, marketing and any other industry where the goal is to persuade you.

Unmasking the influence principles

The goal of a scammer is to try and influence you to part with your money or other valuable possessions. They rely on classic persuasion and influence principles that take advantage of our psychology and other aspects in our lives.

The reason we pay attention to scammers in the first place is because they rely on the need and greed principle, promising us something we need or desire. In romance scams, that’s love. In investment scams, that’s money. It could also be a job or status.

Scammers may use the authority principle, such as pretending to be your boss and requesting you to transfer money, a scam known as business email compromise.

Or they may use the kindness principle to get you to donate to some bogus humanitarian cause in what are known as fake charity scams.

The principle underlying some of the most costly scams in Australia, such as impersonation, romance, and payment redirection scams is the distraction principle. This relies on us missing the scammers’ “sleight of hand” and clues as to their real intentions.

We are all social animals and believe in safety in numbers. Scammers know this and will use the herd or social proof principle to convince us that we are missing out on those hard-to-get concert tickets, for example.

An insidious form of a foot-in-the-door technique relies on the dishonesty principle. In this case, the scammers might entice you to install a VPN (which happens to be malware) to bypass your organisations’ firewalls or to provide use of your bank account for some international money transfer in money mule scams.

American psychologist Robert Cialdini has noted many of these principles are what salespeople use to get you into buying something you didn’t really want. They are also the principles that politicians, friends and family use to get you to agree to their requests. In other words, they’re not always a sign that you’re being scammed.

To identify a scam, ask yourself these three simple questions:

what is the intent?

who benefits?

do I have a free, informed choice?

Rushing to pay for a holiday booking because the countdown timer indicates you have two minutes left relies on the same scarcity principle as when you transfer your savings into a once-in-a-lifetime investment opportunity. The former is a legitimate transaction, while the latter is an investment scam in which you lose.

Ultimately, the core problem is that every day, we are constantly exposed to such nudges – in the media, online, and in our daily interactions. Over time, it can become difficult to recognise when these nudges are used for negative ends (called “sludges”), and in scams.

This is why anyone can be scammed

Anything that makes us human can be exploited to influence us. Our perception, emotions, relationships, thinking and beliefs can be used to influence our behaviours.

All personality types are susceptible to persuasion, although their “Achilles’ heel” may vary. For example, people who are agreeable (cooperative, kind, compassionate) are generally found to be more susceptible to persuasion, which may make them more susceptible to scammers.

While not everyone will fall for common or generic scams, any of us can fall for a targeted and well-executed one. Demographics play a role in whom scammers choose to target to increase their success rates.

In Australia in 2024, elderly people were commonly targeted in investment and romance scams, while mothers lost thousands to “Hi Mum” scams where someone posing as a family member asks for money. Young people fell prey to threat-based scams. Men tended to lose money in investment scams, while women were more vulnerable to romance scams.

Don’t be too confident

Importantly, overconfidence in our scam savviness can work against us. When we have high trust in our abilities, we tend to assess situations as less risky, taking mental shortcuts in decision-making. Such mental shortcuts can cause us to miss critical cues and red flags.

Different sectors in Australia are working together to warn us all about scams. The “Stop. Check. Protect” approach recommended by Scamwatch also provides very helpful tips to better protect yourself.

Remember today could be the day you get scammed. Prepare accordingly and stay vigilant.

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

A New Treatment For Huntington’s Disease Is Genuinely Promising – But Here’s Why We Still Need Caution

While rare, Huntington’s disease is inherited and fatal. Izuchukwu Onyeka/Getty

BY BRYCE VISSEL

COJOINT PROFESSOR,

SCHOOL OF CLINICAL 

MEDICINE, UNSW SYDNEY

Imagine knowing in your 20s or 30s that you carry a gene which will cause your mind and body to slowly unravel. Huntington’s disease is inherited, relentless and fatal, and there is no cure. Families live with the certainty of decline stretching across generations.

Now, a new treatment is being widely reported as a breakthrough.

Last week, gene therapy company uniQure announced that a one-time brain infusion appeared to slow the disease in a small clinical study.

If confirmed, this would not only be a landmark for Huntington’s disease but potentially the first time a gene therapy has shown promise in any adult-onset neurodegenerative disorder.

But the results, which were announced in a press release, are early, unreviewed and based on external comparisons. So, while these findings offer families hope after decades of failure, we need to remain cautious.

What is Huntington’s disease?

Huntington’s is a rare but devastating disease, affecting around five to ten people in 100,000 in Western countries. That means thousands in Australia and hundreds of thousands worldwide.

Symptoms usually start in mid-life. They include involuntary movements, depression, irritability and progressive decline in thinking and memory. People lose the ability to work, manage money, live independently and eventually care for themselves. Most die ten to 20 years after onset.

The disease is caused by an expanded stretch of certain DNA repeats (CAG) in the huntingtin gene. The number of repeats strongly influences when symptoms begin, with longer expansions usually linked to earlier onset.

Looking for a treatment

The gene that causes Huntington’s disease was identified in 1993, 32 years ago. Soon afterwards, mouse studies showed that switching off the mutant huntingtin protein even after symptoms had begun could reverse signs and improve behaviour.

This suggested lowering the toxic protein might slow or even partly reverse the disease. Yet for three decades, every attempt to develop a therapy for people has failed to show convincing clinical benefit. Trials of huntingtin-lowering drugs and other approaches did not slow progression.

What is the new treatment?

The one-time gene therapy, called AMT-130, involves brain surgery guided by MRI. Surgeons infuse an engineered virus directly into the caudate and putamen brain regions, which are heavily affected in Huntington’s.

The virus carries a short genetic “microRNA” designed to reduce production of the affected huntingtin protein.

By delivering it straight into the brain, the treatment bypasses the blood–brain barrier. This natural wall usually prevents medicines from entering the central nervous system. That barrier helps explain why so many brain-targeted drugs have failed.

What did they find?

Some 29 patients received treatment, with 12 in each group (one low-dose, and one high-dose) followed for three years. According to uniQure, those given the higher dose declined much slower than expected.

The study compared how much participants’ movement, thinking and daily function declined, compared to a matched external group from a global Huntington’s registry (meaning they weren’t part of the study). The company claimed those given the higher dose had a 75% slowing in their decline.

On a functional scale focused on independence, the company reported a 60% slowing in decline for the higher dose group.

Other tests of movement and thinking also favoured treatment. Nerve-cell damage in spinal fluid was lower for study participants than would be expected for untreated patients.

Why should we be cautious?

These findings are an early snapshot of results reported by the company, not yet peer-reviewed. The study compared treated patients to an external matched control group, not people randomised to placebo at the same time. This design can introduce bias. The numbers are also small – only 12 patients at the three-year mark – so we can’t draw solid conclusions.

The company reports the therapy was generally well tolerated, with no new serious adverse events related to the drug since late 2022. Most problems were related to the neurosurgical infusion itself, and resolved. But in a disease that already causes such severe symptoms, it is often hard to know what counts as a side effect.

The company uniQure has said it plans to seek regulatory approval in 2026 on the basis of this dataset.

Regulators will face difficult decisions: whether to allow access sooner before all the questions and uncertainties are addressed – based on the needs of a community with no effective options – and wait for further data while people are being treated, or to insist on larger trials that confirm results before approval.

What does it mean?

If upheld, these results represent the first convincing signs that a gene-targeted therapy can slow Huntington’s disease. They may also be the first evidence of benefit from a gene therapy in any adult-onset neurodegenerative disorder. That would be a milestone after decades of failure.

But these results do not prove success. Only larger, longer and fully peer-reviewed studies will show whether this treatment truly changes lives. Even if approved, a complex neurosurgical gene therapy may not be easily accessible to all patients.

The company has said the drug’s price would be similar to other gene therapies – which can cost over A$3 million per patient – and will have the added cost of brain surgery.

The takeaway

For families who carry this gene, the hope is profound. But caution is just as important.

We may be witnessing the first credible step toward slowing an inherited adult-onset neurodegenerative disease, or just an early signal that may not hold up.

Ultimately, only time and rigorous science will show whether this treatment delivers the benefits so urgently needed.

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

In Swipe At Trump, Brazil’s Lula Tells UN That Organized Crime Is Not Terrorism

Lula dedicated part of his speech at the opening of the United Nations General Assembly to expressing his concern about the U.S. stance toward Latin America. AP Photo/Richard Drew

BY THIAGO RODRIGUES

PROFESSOR DE RELACOES

INTERNACIONAIS, UNIVERSIDADE,

FEDERAL FLUMINENSE

Much of Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s address at the opening of the 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly was expected.

Condemnation of U.S. interventionism against Brazil and Israeli action in the Gaza Strip have long been part of the rhetoric of the veteran leftist leader. So too has been the need to fight global hunger and speak up for global environmental initiatives.

But, besides those expected major themes, Lula’s speech also embarked on new territory, noticeably on the issue of organized crime and terrorism. “It is worrying to equate crime with terrorism,” Lula noted.

That was a direct reference to U.S. President Donald Trump’s attempts to equate Latin American organized crime groups with terrorist organizations.

Such conflation has been part of Trump’s agenda since the very first day of his second administration. On Jan. 20, 2025, he signed an executive order that ordered the inclusion of Latin American organized crime groups on the list of designated terrorist organizations.

As a result, entities like Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua, Ecuador’s Los Choneros, Mexico’s Cartel de Sinaloa and El Salvador’s Mara Salvatrucha now share space with Boko Haram and the Islamic State group on the State Department’s list of “Foreign Terrorist Organizations.”

Just rhetoric?

The association between drug trafficking and terrorism is not new in U.S. foreign policy. In the 1980s, groups like Sendero Luminoso in Peru and the Medellín Cartel in Colombia were classified as “narco-terrorists” because they fought their own governments using weapons funded by cocaine trafficking.

Ronald Reagan’s administration presented narco-terrorism as a serious threat to American safety. He sent the Army to combat international trafficking and exhorted Andean countries to turn their military into anti-narcotics troops.

The policy left a strong legacy in countries like Colombia, Peru and Mexico, where armies were converted into a de facto military super-police.

In the process, they lost the capacity to act as effective national defense forces.

After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the relationship between drug trafficking and terrorism was updated. Islamic fundamentalist groups like al-Qaida were accused by the U.S. Department of State of financing their operations through heroin and other drug trafficking.

With the support of a frightened society, President George W. Bush’s government built an anti-terrorist legal and institutional framework that gave the state exceptional powers to repress anyone it deemed to be a “terrorist.”

And in the post-9/11 world, being a “terrorist” held serious consequences in regard to how U.S. authorities could, and would, treat you.

Terrorists were arrested without formal charges. They were tortured and detained in unknown places for an indefinite period of time. Their assets and property were confiscated, their bank accounts interdicted and their resources absorbed by the authorities without accountability.

Today, when Trump extends the classification of “terrorist” to transnational organized crime groups, the tacit understanding is it allows any Latin American accused of international drug dealing to be treated outside the rules of a democratic state of law. That includes to be captured outside the U.S. with no access to any diplomatic aid, to be sent to Guantánamo or to simply disappear.

Geopolitical pressure

Since the 1970s, the so-called “war on drugs” has been an instrument of U.S. diplomatic and geopolitical pressure. It was used to blackmail governments in Latin America, align repressive policies with U.S. guidelines and justify the presence of military personnel, intelligence and military bases in the region, among other forms of intervention.

Since 2001, the “war on terror” has served similar purposes around the world, but with little impact in Latin America. Now, the new classification for Latin American criminal organizations synchronizes the “war on drugs” with the “war on terror.”

More than rhetoric, the U.S. State Department’s updated list allows the government to reinforce the interventionism in Latin America at a particularly sensitive time.

The U.S. is facing a serious domestic political crisis and an unprecedented global challenge posed by China’s consistent and vertiginous rise as a world economic and military power.

The Chinese economic and commercial presence in Latin America poses a concrete threat to the hegemony that the U.S. established on the continent.

Brazil and Mexico – the region’s largest economies – are making Trump’s trade pressure instruments, such as tariffs, much less effective than expected.

In this context, Trump has deployed a military naval force near the Venezuelan coast, reactivating accusations that the regime led by Nicolás Maduro is a “narco-state.”

Trump accuses Maduro of being the head of a group called the Cartel de los Soles, supposedly formed by high-ranking military personnel. The only sources claiming that such a cartel exists are the U.S. itself and voices linked to the ultra-right Venezuelan opposition in exile. However, the accusation is serious and influences U.S. public opinion.

In the same vein, the U.S. government has just “decertified” Gustavo Petro’s Colombia from its list of countries partnering Washington’s effort to fight transnational drugs trafficking – a move that could lead to economic sanctions and cuts in credit lines, loans and military aid.

Following the drug money

Arguing against this logic of unilateral U.S. action, Lula, in his U.N. address, emphasized multilateral cooperation to combat international drug trafficking. And the focus, in his point of view, must be to go after the economic assets of organized crime groups, and their money laundering strategies.

The mention of money laundering refers to the recent actions taken by the Brazilian Federal Police and other local authorities that uncovered huge money laundering schemes from drug trafficking organizations in Brazil’s largest city, São Paulo.

The scheme was carried out through financial institutions, gas stations, hotels and many other “regular” businesses. The initiatives were considered successful because they led to the arrest and indictment of organized crime financial operators, and not the usual low-level streets dealers – who are invariably poor, and Black.

Lula’s talk of international cooperation likely referred to the inauguration of the Center for International Police Cooperation in the Brazilian state of Amazonas. The center is an initiative to coordinate intelligence efforts in the fight against crimes in the Amazon. It brings together representatives of nine Brazilian states and security forces from eight Pan-Amazon countries – and France, on behalf of French Guiana.

The inclusion of the issue of organized crime in Lula’s speech at the U.N. can be seen as an additional front in his opposition to the government of Trump. Like environmental issues, the issue of organized crime is both an internal and international problem for Brazil.

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Civil Society Helps Uphold Democracy And Provides Built-In Resistance To Authoritarianism

Alex Soros is the board chair of the Open Society Foundations, the philanthropy funded by his father, George Soros. AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta

BY CHRISTOPHER JUSTIN EINOLF

PROFESSOR OF SOCIOLOGY,

NORTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY

The New York Times reports that a senior Department of Justice official recently “instructed more than a half dozen U.S. attorneys’ offices to draft plans to investigate” the Open Society Foundations – philanthropies funded by the billionaire George Soros.

Citing a document that the news outlet said its reporters had seen, the report listed possible charges the foundations could face “ranging from arson to material support of terrorism.”

The philanthropic institution denied any wrongdoing.

“These accusations are politically motivated attacks on civil society, meant to silence speech the administration disagrees with and undermine the First Amendment right to free speech,” Open Society Foundations stated in response to the reported investigations. “When power is abused to take away the rights of some people, it puts the rights of all people at risk.”

The term “civil society” isn’t familiar to all Americans. But it’s part of what helped this country grow and thrive because it encompasses many of the institutions that uphold the American way of life. As a sociologist who studies nonprofits and civil society in the U.S and around the world, I have always been interested in the relationship between the health of a nation’s civil society and the strength of rights and freedom within its borders.

I’ve also noticed that often the term is used without a definition. But I think that it’s important for Americans to become more familiar with what civil society is and how it helps sustain democracy in the United States.

Civil society

The Encyclopedia Britannica defines civil society as “the dense network of groups, communities, networks and ties that stand between the individual and the modern state.”

This constellation of institutions consists of not-for-profit organizations and special interest groups, either formal or informal, working to improve the lives of their constituents. It includes charitable groups, clubs and voluntary associations, churches and other houses of worship, labor unions, grassroots associations, community organizations, foundations, museums and other kinds of nonprofits – including nonprofit media outlets.

Civil society does not include government agencies or for-profit businesses.

Political scientists and sociologists have long claimed that a healthy civil society, which in the U.S. includes a strong and independent nonprofit sector, helps sustain democracy. This is true even though most nonprofits don’t engage in partisan political activities.

My own analysis of survey data from 64 countries has shown that authoritarians have begun to use civil society groups to support their own purposes. But in the United States, at least, most civil society organizations still support democratic values.

Sometimes, scholars call civil society “the third sector” to distinguish it from the public and private spheres.

Most scholars agree that civil society strengthens and protects democracy, and that true democracy is impossible without it. These scholars distinguish between liberal democracies and illiberal democracies.

Liberal democracies have a separation of powers – meaning the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government. They protect individual rights, allow a free press, maintain an independent judiciary and safeguard the rights of minorities.

In illiberal democracies, there are periodic elections, but they are not necessarily fair or free. Civil society tends to be more restricted in illiberal democracies than in liberal ones.

An American strength from the start

The strength of America’s civil society helps explain the long success of democracy in the United States.

In 1835, when the French scholar and diplomat Alexis de Tocqueville visited the country, he marveled at the tendency of Americans to “constantly unite.” They created associations, he wrote, “to give fêtes, to found seminaries, to build inns, to raise churches, to distribute books, to send missionaries to the antipodes; in this manner they create hospitals, prisons, schools.”

Whereas the government initiated grand projects in France and the nobility did so in England, in the United States voluntary associations of ordinary individuals were behind most great endeavors.

What happens in nondemocratic countries

One way to see how important a robust civil society can be is to look at what happens in countries that do not have one.

The totalitarian countries of the 20th century, particularly communist China and the Soviet Union, outlawed civil society under the pretense that the party and the state represented the people’s true interests.

When the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, the United States and Western Europe devoted much diplomacy and foreign aid to helping the former USSR and the countries of Eastern Europe develop civil society institutions, believing this to be a precondition of those countries’ transition to democracy.

Today, civil society flourishes in formerly communist nations that have successfully made the transition to democracy, such as the Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Civil society is restricted in that region’s countries that don’t embrace democracy, such as Belarus and Russia.

Not your grandma’s authoritarians

Today’s authoritarian rulers realize that civil society has the potential to support democracy and pry loose their grip on power. But few of those leaders outlaw civil society organizations entirely.

Instead, authoritarian leaders subordinate civil society organizations to achieve their own ends. In China, which had no civil society before the 1990s, the Communist Party now creates government-organized nongovernmental organizations, or GONGOs, which look like nonprofits and are technically separate from the state, but remain under state control.

Some authoritarians who take power in countries that already have a civil society sector tame these organizations and harness their power through a range of oppressive tactics. They leave alone service-providing organizations, like food banks, free clinics and homeless shelters, and use them to show citizens how they are bringing them benefits.

However, they crack down on advocacy organizations, such as human rights groups, labor unions and feminist groups, as these are a source of potential opposition to the regime. They then cultivate pro-regime civil society institutions, providing them with formal and informal support.

When authoritarians crack down on civil society groups, they sometimes destroy offices and imprison the organization’s leaders and members of their staff. But they generally use more subtle means.

For example, they may pass laws restricting the amount of funding, particularly foreign funding, available to nonprofits. They add layers of red tape that make it hard for nonprofits to operate, such as audits, registration requirements and information requests.

Authoritarians may use those hurdles selectively. Nonprofits that are neutral or friendly to the regime may find they can operate freely. Nonprofits the regime perceives as opponents undergo extensive audits, are forced to wait a long time when they seek to incorporate, and face constant demands for personal information about their funders, members and clients.

Attacks in the United States

Even before news broke of the Trump administration’s reported demand that the Open Societies Foundations be investigated, there were mounting signs that the U.S. was becoming more like authoritarian countries than it used to be in terms of how it treats civil society.

In March 2025, for example, President Donald Trump signed an executive order restricting a federal program that forgives student loans for people who work in public service organizations or the government. The order said that employees of institutions that the Trump administration deems to “have a substantial illegal purpose,” such as providing services to undocumented immigrants or serving the needs of transgender clients, would become ineligible for loan forgiveness.

Over the summer, Congress held three investigative hearings on nonprofits. The Republican Party’s leadership signaled its disdain and distrust of those groups with hearing titles like “Public Funds, Private Agendas: NGOs Gone Wild, ”How Leftist Nonprofit Networks Exploit Federal Tax Dollars to Advance a Radical Agenda,“ and "An Inside Job: How NGOs Facilitated the Biden Border Crisis.”

After the murder of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, Vice President JD Vance threatened “to go after the NGO network that foments, facilitates and engages in violence,” including the Ford Foundation and the Open Society Foundations, despite the fact that there is no evidence that these organizations support violence.

Some nonprofits have published open letters, issued public statements and provided congressional testimony in opposition to the administration’s claims.

What happens next is unclear. The threat to strip organizations of their nonprofit status may be an empty one, given that the Supreme Court has already ruled that doing so is regulated by law and the president cannot do it on a whim.

Many scholars of nonprofits are watching to see if the United States takes more steps down this road to authoritarianism, stays where it is or reverses course.

We are studying how America’s flourishing civil society resists any restrictions that limit the freedoms that have largely been taken for granted – until now.

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