On a chilly Tuesday morning in Dublin, a crowd gathered outside Government Buildings with a message that was at once simple and deeply emotional: Ireland’s neutrality does not belong to the Government, and it should not be changed without asking the people. The protest had been called by Sinn Féin, and it came just weeks after a Dáil vote that had shaken the political establishment. By a narrow margin of 79 votes to 71, TDs had approved a Bill that would end the requirement for United Nations Security Council approval before Irish peacekeepers can be deployed on certain missions. The…

Across West Africa, elections are more than political events; they are moments of collective decision-making, national soul-searching, and sometimes intense social pressure. In that atmosphere, the quality of information can be as important as the number of ballots cast. That is why the Economic Community of West African States, better known as ECOWAS, has quietly made one of its most significant investments in the minds of citizens: training more than 500 journalists across 12 member states to confront electoral disinformation and strengthen the integrity of the information environment. This effort recently found expression in a two-day capacity-building workshop for journalists…