Brian Snyder/Reuters

A sign reads "VOTE" outside the original site of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Aug. 16, 2020. This year’s DNC will be a largely virtual event due to the pandemic.

Call it the Disruption Election.

As political convention season opens this week – with cheering crowds weirdly absent and most events virtual – America is hurtling toward a presidential vote like no other. It comes amid a historically tumultuous year in which a pandemic has upended much of normal life, a recession has shuttered large parts of the economy, and protests have changed the way many citizens view racial relations and the police.

On the ballot will be an incumbent who was already perhaps the most disruptive U.S. president of modern times – and proudly so. President Donald Trump has broken so many political norms over four years it’s hard to keep track.

Democratic challenger Joe Biden will figure in the outcome, of course. He has so far run a low-key campaign, portraying himself as a traditional presidential figure who won’t fire off controversial tweets or try to divide Americans.

But it seems likely that Election 2020 will end up centering on President Trump – not just his disruptions, but the way he has responded to the pandemic and related crises that have washed over the country, and how those events have, or have not, changed what voters want from their elected leader and their government.

“This is a referendum on Donald Trump, as he kind of willed it to be,” says Joel Payne, a Democratic strategist and communications specialist.  

By definition, the presidential race is now entering a new phase, with the conventions making the tickets official. This week, the Democrats get four days to speak directly to the American people and try to frame the election to their advantage. Next week, President Trump and the Republicans will have their turn to do the same thing.

Conventions often give candidates a bounce in the polls, at least in the short term. But the size of bounces has declined in this highly partisan era, and it’s not clear whether conventions-as-Zoom-meetings will have the same effect. There’s also no time between the conventions this year, as there often is, since the Democrats postponed their event due to the pandemic. That might work to the benefit of the GOP.

Conventions may be set up as giant pep rallies, but they can still have memorable or surprising moments, says Barbara Perry, director of presidential studies at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center.

Carolyn Kaster/AP

Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden and his running mate Sen. Kamala Harris pass each other on the way to the podium during a campaign event at Alexis Dupont High School in Wilmington, Delaware, Aug. 12, 2020.

Al Gore gave his then-wife Tipper a strange kiss at the 2000 Democratic National Convention. The then-little-known Barack Obama turned heads with a compelling speech at the 2004 DNC. Clint Eastwood debated an empty chair at the 2012 Republican National Convention.

“It’s like the circus – someone may fall off the trapeze, or someone may accomplish an amazing feat,” says Dr. Perry.

This year, the medium may be the message for both parties, whether they wish it or not. The difference in the spectacle, with speakers dialing in remotely and no events or activists crowding on the convention floor, may highlight the changes wrought in larger society by the coronavirus.

“We know the number one issue on everyone’s mind will be the pandemic,” says Dr. Perry. “So substantively, how will the parties and the leaders present their plans [to deal with it]?”

November still a good way off

If the election were this week, former Vice President Biden and Sen. Kamala Harris would be heavy favorites over President Trump and Vice President Mike Pence. Given Mr. Biden’s continued, steady poll lead of between 7 and 10 points over the president, he would win 72 out of every 100 simulated votes run with current numbers, according to the FiveThirtyEight election forecast.

But the election is still a good way off, politically-speaking. As FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver wrote last week, it’s not uncommon for polls to make big swings between mid-August and Election Day. Since 1976, three of the presidential candidates leading at this point in the race ended up losing the popular vote: Michael Dukakis in 1988, George W. Bush in 2000, and John Kerry in 2004. (Mr. Bush blew a 10-point lead, but still ended up narrowly winning the Electoral College and the Oval Office.)

The presidential debates are still to come. The pandemic might abate somewhat between now and November. The economy could show signs of life.

“I have a hard time believing that Trump will lose by eight points nationally,” says Alex Conant, a Republican political consultant who served as a spokesman for Sen. Marco Rubio’s 2016 presidential campaign. “I think the race is really going to tighten.”

The reaction to this probable tightening – from Democrats, Republicans, the media – could also be crucial, Mr. Conant says. Will it cause a round of negative coverage for the Democratic ticket that feeds on itself and tightens the race further, dampening enthusiasm for Mr. Biden and exciting Trump supporters? Could we end up with 2016 all over again, with Mr. Trump losing the popular vote but eking out a win in the Electoral College?

So far, Mr. Biden has been perfectly happy to keep his head down and not mix it up with the incumbent, as challengers typically do, Mr. Conant says. A change in the direction of the race could upend that strategy.

“Part of this is that Biden is not a candidate who has ever generated a lot of enthusiasm and media coverage,” he says. 

A politically difficult fall

To many Americans, the coronavirus remains the most important issue facing the nation, by far. The virus has crushed livelihoods, taken away freedom of movement, spread fear, and stolen lives.

For many parents of school-age children, the question of whether or not it is safe to open schools – and what to do about child care and education if it isn’t – overwhelms almost everything else. For them and the nation as a whole, this promises to be a politically difficult fall.

That holds for President Trump as well. The chief executive who initially dismissed the virus as something that would fade away, and who has since pushed governors to reopen their states and localities to reopen their schools, does not fare well in polls on the issue. 58% of Americans disapprove of the president’s handling of the pandemic, according to a RealClearPolitics rolling average of major surveys, while only 39.8% approve.

Voters appear unimpressed by Mr. Trump’s attempts to shift blame for the virus to China, or to present his administration’s role in the U.S. response as a success. The U.S. has 5.4 million cases and has lost about 170,000 lives – far more than any other country.

“In most presidential elections involving the incumbent, the race is most likely to be a referendum on the incumbent’s performance in office,” says William Galston, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution.

Mr. Trump has made some efforts to change that dynamic and make the race about Mr. Biden, but so far to little effect, says Dr. Galston. The former vice president has instead proved difficult to define.

Unlike, say, Sen. Bernie Sanders, Mr. Biden can’t be credibly painted as a leftist. In fact, several former Republican leaders, including former Ohio Gov. John Kasich, are speaking tonight at the DNC in support of Mr. Biden. He’s stayed out of the spotlight and hasn’t injected himself into the political conversation at times when Mr. Trump is saying or doing controversial things. Mr. Biden has worked steadily to try to unify the Democratic Party around him and his agenda, to the extent that’s possible.

During convention season, Mr. Trump’s goal should be to broaden his support, not intensify it, says the Brookings scholar. His base is already strong. 

“Biden’s goal is the exact opposite. Biden’s support now is broad. He needs to intensify it,” says Dr. Galston.

The context for such efforts, of course, is a polarized nation in which most people have already made up their minds about politics and take their cues from their ideological “team.”

“We remain a highly divided country, and it’s getting harder and harder to find persuadable voters,” says Spencer Critchley, a Democratic communications consultant and author of the book, “Patriots of Two Nations: Why Trump Was Inevitable and What Happens Next.”

That said, conventions and other events which focus attention on the nation’s political conversation remain key components of the election cycle, says Mr. Critchley.

As the number of persuadable voters shrinks, every fraction of a percent that a campaign can move becomes a larger share of the small slice of swing voters that may decide who sits in the Oval Office for the next four years.

“Every opportunity to communicate is important,” Mr. Critchley says.

When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu set July 1 as a target to begin moves to annex portions of the occupied West Bank, securing a place in history was also in his sights.

Now, just weeks later, Mr. Netanyahu has traded one date with history for an entirely different one: an agreement to normalize ties with the United Arab Emirates in return for putting annexation on ice for the near future.

The move, announced last week with President Donald Trump, would make the UAE only the third Arab country to agree to full relations with Israel in its 72-year history. And it has won Mr. Netanyahu comparisons to iconic Israeli leaders who cut peace deals with Egypt and Jordan – Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Rabin, respectively.

It also showed signs of shifting how Israelis view themselves in the region.

Suddenly, Israel’s news media is flush with images of Dubai skyscrapers and breathless speculation about the Arab countries that might be next in line – Bahrain, Morocco, Oman, even Sudan. After years of talk about the quiet alliance with Gulf Arab nations, the deal taps Israelis’ longings for normalcy and acceptance in the Middle East, a thirst that cuts across the lines of Israel’s fractured politics.

“Israel is part of this region, and the fact that we have been isolated from them for 72 years on a formal basis is coming to an end. I think that we haven’t really begun to understand the huge impact. If this thing does what it’s supposed to do, the entire region can benefit,” says Jonathan Medved, the founder of OurCrowd, a Jerusalem-based venture capital investment company.

Palestinians left out

Yet other Israelis put the diplomatic accomplishment in the context of other immediate and longer-term national priorities, including battling the coronavirus and securing peace with the Palestinians.

Tamar Sidi, a psychologist in Herzliya, says while normalized ties with the UAE would be wonderful, she thinks that Mr. Netanyahu is overblowing the dimensions of his achievement. Israel has had informal ties with the UAE that go back more than a decade, and Mr. Netanyahu’s annexation move was blocked, politically and diplomatically. She says she’s concerned that the Palestinians are being left out of the equation.  

“That’s the main problem we have, so I wonder where that is in the grand scheme,” she says.

Though the deal doesn’t include direct progress on a two-state solution with the Palestinians, Israeli peace advocates believe the mothballing of Mr. Netanyahu’s annexation push (the prime minister insisted he hasn’t given up on it yet) is nevertheless a historic blow to the Israeli right.

“This was the Netanyahu dream to make history: bring back the biblical land to the people of Israel. This was the dream of the settlers,” says Alon Liel, a peace activist and a former Israeli ambassador. “He worked hard to accumulate political support in Israel. He had a majority in the Knesset. And, boom, suddenly the world is stopping it. This is a knockout for the imperialist visions of Israel.”

Mr. Liel also sees a shift in Israelis’ thinking about their place in the region. “In the last 15 years, Israel ran away from the Middle East into the arms of the East European countries like Greece, Romania, Poland, Hungary,” he says. “The Middle East might be our physical neighborhood, but not our cultural and commercial neighborhood.

“Here, suddenly, Israel discovered that there are Arabs that are worth being friendly with and associating with,” he adds, tongue-in-cheek. “Not only selling arms, but tourism and commerce.”

Emil Salman/Reuters

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, standing next to Transportation Minister Miri Regev, addresses the media at Israel's Ben Gurion International Airport, in Lod near Tel Aviv, on Aug. 17, 2020.

Until now, Israelis traveling to the UAE have been required to enter with passports of a third-party country. Religiously observant Israelis like Mr. Medved would replace their skullcaps with baseball caps to lower their profile – even if their Emirati counterparts knew exactly where they came from. Conversations between the two countries needed to be held over the internet – though the phone links were opened on Sunday.

“This is one of the things that’s not right or left, Trump or Biden, Bibi or Gantz,” Mr. Medved says, referring to the prime minister by his nickname and his recent election rival, Benny Gantz. “Everyone should say, hooray. This is really good news. What’s the downside?”

A consensus play

Indeed, a poll by Israel’s Channel 12 television news found that 76.7% of Israelis prefer normalization with the UAE to annexation; 16.5% preferred the opposite. In a June poll, Mr. Netanyahu’s annexation push had garnered tepid support – 4% – as a government priority.

The surprise deal with the UAE, on the other hand, spoke much more to the Israel consensus. That gives the prime minister a chance to change the subject at a time when he faces regular demonstrations outside his residence over the pandemic-induced economic crisis and his corruption trials. The deal also comes at a time when coalition bickering is driving speculation that Israel is headed toward elections yet again.    

“This is Netanyahu pulling a diplomatic rabbit out of the hat that says ‘only Bibi’ can lead,” says Jason Pearlman, a communications consultant who recently advised a rival to Mr. Netanyahu in his Likud party.

“This is something that’s mainstream. There are even a bunch of left-wingers that will appreciate this. He’s desperately trying to retain his political qualitative edge: He’s lost on corona, he lost on annexation, he can’t claim he’s strong against Hamas; what else can he claim? He’s bringing regional peace.”

The deal with the UAE would strengthen the geopolitical alliance between Israel and Sunni Arab countries in the Middle East against Iran, Syria, and its Lebanese Shiite ally Hezbollah.

It could open the way for a blossoming of bilateral trade – something that never materialized in Israel’s peace with Jordan or Egypt. Business analysts note the UAE has built a diversified economy that is likely to embrace Israel’s innovative technology startups in sectors from finance to green energy to water. Israeli tourists are likely to be attracted to Dubai’s hotels and shopping.

“Everybody’s talking about it. Apparently the prices are not expensive. It’s less than a three-hour flight and luxurious,” says Tom Misgav, a Tel Aviv lawyer who has already perused a travel website for Dubai resorts. “From what I’m hearing, they’re just waiting for the Israelis to come.”

New thinking about Netanyahu

The UAE agreement scrambled the usual chorus of detractors and advocates of the prime minister. 

Nahum Barnea, a left-leaning political columnist for the Yediot Ahronot newspaper, wrote that the deal is “historically significant in regional and domestic Israeli terms. ... Netanyahu deserves high regard.”

Yet leaders of Jewish settlers in the West Bank – some of Mr. Netanyahu’s most loyal backers – alleged betrayal and warned the prime minister was headed toward a break with his ideological base. In three consecutive election campaigns since 2019, Mr. Netanyahu made annexation a central promise.

“If the state of Israel sells sovereignty [in the West Bank] for a piece of paper from a country that has never threatened Israel and is far away from Israel, that’s a scam,” shouted Yossi Dagan, the head of the Shomron regional council of settlements.

For now, the deal plays to the prime minister’s strategy of normalizing ties with countries in the region first and then turning to the Palestinians – known as the “outside-in” approach. But it’s unclear whether it will all add up to a boost in Mr. Netanyahu’s political standing. Though some believe that the move will attract Israelis in the political center, he has alienated many through years of divisive rule.

“You can’t avoid that we haven’t solved the Palestinian situation. We may dream of one thousand days and nights in Dubai, but we live more with Gaza,” says Mr. Misgav, who wondered aloud whether the history-making move will whet Mr. Netanyahu’s appetite for new diplomatic moves.

“Maybe it will change his perception. Does he want to go down in history as a prime minister who went to jail on three corruption indictments, or as a peacemaker?”

Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi/AP

A truck carrying police enters a neighborhood in Harare on July, 31, 2020. Zimbabwe's capital was deserted as security agents vigorously enforced the country's lockdown amid planned protests.

When Zimbabwean activists began planning mass protests against corruption in mid-July, the country’s authorities turned to a familiar playbook to shut down their opposition.

They began rounding up government critics and arrested a prominent journalist, Hopewell Chin’ono, who had exposed a corruption scandal around the government’s purchase of personal protective equipment for health care workers. A new curfew – allegedly to prevent the spread of coronavirus – slid into place, preventing movement after 6 p.m. And on July 30, a day before the proposed marches, the police warned that participants would “be regarded as terrorists.”

The next morning, the streets were empty.

Government, it seemed, had won.

But online, it was a different story. In and outside Zimbabwe, the hashtag #ZimbabweanLivesMatter was gathering strength, first among Zimbabweans airing grievances with their government, and soon, by people around the world expressing solidarity.

“The key aspect from the #ZimbabweanLivesMatter is that people are finding a safe space online where they can express themselves without the usual violence that they see on the streets,” says Fadzayi Mahere, a lawyer and activist with the opposition Movement for Democratic Change Alliance, who livestreamed her own arrest on July 31 after she posted photos of herself on Twitter staging a small protest in her neighborhood. (She is now out on bail.)

In many ways, #ZimbabweanLivesMatter feels like a protest movement custom-built for the year 2020 – online, borderless, and in the orbit of the #BlackLivesMatter movement still ricocheting around the globe. And like #BlackLivesMatter, #ZimbabweanLivesMatter has become a megaphone to express grief, anger, and resistance – and to give those sentiments a global audience. 

“Globally, we have a situation where COVID-19 is highlighting inequalities in societies all around the world, and at the same time the BLM movement is showing the ways in which Black lives are not valued in many different societies,” says Asanda Ngoasheng, a South African political analyst. “So people are already primed to understand what this movement [#ZimbabweanLivesMatter] is all about.”

But the movement is also a cautionary tale about the real-life consequences of online activism. Several demonstrators have been arrested for their social media posts, according to activists, and the Zimbabwean government is working on a cybersecurity law that critics say will further shrink the allowable space for online dissent.

Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi/AP

People carry buckets to fetch water past a police checkpoint in Harare, Zimbabwe, on July, 31, 2020. Police and soldiers manned checkpoints and ordered people seeking to get into the city for work and other chores to return home amid a lockdown.

Compounding crises

Scrolling #ZimbabweanLivesMatter on Twitter or Instagram illustrates why Zimbabweans are so outraged. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic began earlier this year, the country was gripped by a deep economic crisis. Inflation had climbed into the triple digits, and many staple goods like basic food, gasoline, and soap were either prohibitively expensive or simply unavailable. Eight million people – half the country’s population – needed food aid.

The economic collapse was especially painful because it happened under the watch of President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who unseated Robert Mugabe after 37 years of rule in November 2017, promising to open the country’s struggling economy to the world. Instead, the backslide continued, along with political violence and repression to rival anything Mr. Mugabe’s regime had meted out.

So when the pandemic arrived in March, it hit a place already suffering deeply. In a country where the majority of the population works informally, restrictions on movement and markets left most people out of work overnight, with little or no government aid. Health care workers walked off the job, arguing they were risking their lives, often without protective gear, for a salary of less than $100 a month.

In June, Mr. Chin’ono wrote a series of tweets alleging government officials were siphoning off money destined for protective gear for health care workers by purchasing it at heavily inflated prices.

The investigations helped lead to the arrest of Obadiah Moyo, who had recently been fired as minister of health and child care. Mr. Chin’ono soon began making allegations that the president’s son, Collins Mnangagwa, had been involved in corruption as well, causing a spokesperson for ZANU-PF, the ruling party, to caution journalists against attacks against the first family.

On July 20, Mr. Chin’ono was at home when a group of men broke into his house and announced that he was under arrest. He live-tweeted the arrest, and it quickly went viral. Mr. Chin’ono, who has been denied bail, now faces charges of inciting public violence for supporting the demonstrations.

In the days that followed, a wave of other activists tweeted their own protests and arrests.

Turn to the web

But those who stayed off the streets weren’t out of danger. Since the #ZimbabweanLivesMatter campaign began, several people have been arrested for posts on Twitter and WhatsApp, a messaging application, according to Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights. (Back in January 2019, amid protests over fuel prices, Mr. Mnangagwa’s government turned off internet access entirely.)

Meanwhile, government is at work on the Cyber Security and Data Protection Bill, which it has said will provide direly needed regulations for the country’s information technology sector. But critics say the law contains provisions that could be used to crack down on activists.

Philimon Bulawayo/Reuters

Police officers patrol the street ahead of planned anti-government protests during the coronavirus outbreak in Harare, Zimbabwe, July 31, 2020.

Chris Musodza, a digital communications expert formerly with the Digital Society of Zimbabwe (now known as the Digital Society of Africa), which provides digital security support to activists, cites sections on cyberbullying and publishing false information with intent to harm, which he says could be used to punish government critics for social media posts.

Still, experts say the #ZimbabweanLivesMatter hashtag has given critics of Mr. Mnangagwa’s rule something they desperately needed: international attention.

“When you see [South African President Cyril] Ramaphosa appointing a special envoy to Zimbabwe, or the African Union chairman raising concern about what’s happening in the country – all those kinds of actions are related to the high publicity that’s come with this campaign,” says Dewa Mavhinga, the southern Africa director for Human Rights Watch. “It’s feeding on and amplifying the voices of activists on the ground.”

Moses, who declined to give his last name for safety, works as a gas station attendant near Harare. He says he tried to get into Harare’s downtown on July 31 when he was turned back by a police roadblock.

When he got home, he logged online, and saw the tide of voices calling for change on social media.

“I am just relieved that we are now using social media to protest against the hunger, poverty, and persecution we are suffering in Zimbabwe,” he says.

Editor’s note: A previous version of this story misstated Chris Musodza’s affiliation with the Digital Society of Africa.

When she was growing up in Puerto Rico, Alma Couverthie says Election Day was a celebration.

There were caravans playing music, and people combed through towns to make sure everyone was registered to vote. Her whole family, including her younger brothers, came along when she got her electoral ID card.

“It’s very different from the [mainland] United States,” she says. “That environment is what makes people go out to vote more than anything else. ... It is the acknowledgment of our role in democracy.”

Today, Ms. Couverthie serves as the national organizing director of the League of Women Voters, an organization established in 1920 to help American women harness their new political power after the 19th Amendment gave many – but not all – the right to vote. 

In the century since, an increasingly diverse range of women have become active voters. During the 2018 midterms, 53% of voters were women; since 2000, the number of registered voters who are nonwhite women has increased by 59%, according to the Center for American Progress. 

However, a landmark survey released this year by the Knight Foundation also found that women make up more than half of the most politically disengaged Americans, and this is even truer for nonwhite women. 

Disengagement is a double-sided issue, sometimes attributed to logistical barriers, such as a lack of polling sites or strict voter ID requirements, which disproportionately affect people of color. But such hurdles, combined with a history of exclusion, can also lead to feelings of doubt or resentment toward the act of voting itself, experts say.

“The political system has been set up in a way where certain kinds of people are systematically excluded, and people of all kinds really have seen that governmental responsiveness has declined in recent decades,” says Hahrie Han, director of the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University and professor of political science. 

Actions like participating in a Facebook group or signing an online petition may seem more accessible or meaningful than voting, she adds. “People are more likely to come off the sidelines if they feel like their participation matters.”

Nonwhite women have historically been sidelined by voting rights movements. While Black women were early leaders in the suffrage movement, and many white suffragists believed that the 19th Amendment would ultimately empower all women, racism within the movement was pervasive. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who launched the women’s rights movement, often argued that middle-class white women were more deserving of the vote than Black men.

In a 1913 demonstration, Black women were asked to march separately to avoid angering the Southern supporters. Investigative journalist and activist Ida B. Wells refused to be segregated and took her place among allies in the Illinois delegation. However, Wells and other Black women did not continue working with the National American Woman Suffrage Association after the parade, focusing instead on racial justice work that included voting rights and anti-lynching legislation. Racial terror campaigns prevented Black women from utilizing their vote until the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965. 

Puerto Rico has been a U.S. territory since 1898, but its population of 3.2 million still can’t vote for president. Today, marginalized communities across the country are often stripped of political power through gerrymandering and other forms of voter suppression.

No vote, no shame

It’s a lesson Miranda Mishan has learned over the past year while working as a community development policy coordinator at Native American Youth and Family Center (NAYA) in Portland, Oregon. After the 2016 presidential election, people were eager to shame those who didn’t vote, she says. 

“I was sort of open to that kind of attitude, but since I’ve been at NAYA, I try to be more patient,” says Ms. Mishan, a Chickasaw Nation citizen who also identifies as Muscogee Creek. “No one who is Native decided to be American and be a part of this civic government, so if they don’t want to engage civically, it’s something I respect and I understand.”

Native Americans didn’t have the opportunity to vote until four years after the 19th Amendment, when the 1924 Snyder Act granted citizenship to all Native Americans born in the U.S. And, like African Americans, they didn’t truly secure the right to vote in every state until decades later. According to 2010 census data, the turnout rate among Native Americans and Native Alaskans voters has been lower than other U.S. racial or ethnic groups by as many as 10 percentage points, though recent research suggests the gap may be shrinking.

Ms. Mishan focuses on removing the logistical barriers for NAYA clients who do want to vote, whether by running a registration form to the post office or helping compile information about candidates. 

NAYA also houses the Portland Youth and Elders Council, a grassroots group that meets monthly. The council organizes conversations with local officials and other opportunities for the community to stay informed about political issues, regardless of voting status.

A reason to engage

Carina Miller, a Warm Springs tribal member who grew up on the Warm Springs Reservation in rural Oregon, understands the power of a handful of votes. In the last tribal council election, one of the candidates lost to her own father by three votes. That’s not unusual for tribal governments, she says, where leaders tend to be male elders.

Ms. Miller says that Native people may be less motivated to vote in national and state elections, considering the painful history of colonization and controversial policies like voter ID laws. But she also sees a need for more Native American policymakers, and is currently running for the Oregon State Senate.

“I kind of am on this spectrum where I’m like, ‘Come on, tribal people, we need to vote.’ And I’m like, ‘Come on, politicians, we need to do better and give tribal people a reason to vote,’” says Ms. Miller.

Ms. Couverthie, from the League of Women Voters, says encouragement may come from those most politically disenfranchised.

“One of the most effective and powerful voter registration [volunteers] I have met was an undocumented Salvadoran woman,” she says. “She would be very honest about the fact that she could not vote, and that’s why she needed everyone that could to go and do it.”

This is sometimes called a “love vote,” she adds.

There are more than 700 local leagues in the country. Ms. Couverthie hopes that by working with “trusted messengers” who are already integrated in communities, her organization can boost enthusiasm around voting. And despite the shortcomings of the 19th Amendment, Ms. Couverthie still draws inspiration from the sacrifices of those early suffragists.

“We cannot forget that even though it was an imperfect win, it took 72 years to get there, and that the women who started fighting so that we all could vote did not see it come to fruition,” she says. 

“Remembering that history and where we come from is very important, because we still have a lot of work to do to make sure that everyone has the same rights.”

AP

A driverless train passes a marina in Dubai, United Arab Emirate.

In survey after survey, nearly half of young people in the Arab world say they would prefer to live in one small Gulf country, the United Arab Emirates. And for good reason. Since the Arab Spring of 2011-12, no Arab country has succeeded better at staving off discontent among its youth in order to keep its leaders in power. The UAE, a federation of sheikhdoms governed by an absolute monarchy, has spun its oil wealth into an island of peace and prosperity in the Middle East.

On Aug. 13, the UAE’s ambition to quell youthful dissent – and along with it any support for radical Islam – took a big leap. In a deal brokered by the United States, the UAE agreed to normalize relations with Israel. In return, Israel agreed to suspend a plan to annex parts of the West Bank, giving temporary hope to Palestinians of a homeland in the future.

The UAE’s move comes more than 25 years after Jordan recognized Israel and more than 40 years since Egypt did so. A few other Arab countries, such as Bahrain and Oman, may follow the UAE’s lead, according to Israeli officials. With the Palestinian cause fading among Arabs and with Iran rising as a threat, some Arab leaders see Israel as a potential partner, especially in trade and investment.

In fact, the UAE hopes its official ties with Israel will “expand opportunities for young people” by enhancing growth and innovation. Israel is admired in the region for its high-tech industries. And with the pandemic and low oil prices challenging petrostates like the UAE, Israel seems more like an opportunity than an opponent.

Pacifying young people remains a top priority of the Middle East’s authoritarian rulers. Recent protests in Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, and Sudan have shown the pro-democracy spirit of the Arab Spring lives on. An overwhelming 89% of young Arabs are worried about finding jobs, according to the 2019 Arab Youth Survey. Two-thirds say religion plays too big a role in the Middle East.

At the same time, use of social media has more than doubled in the past five years. Half of Arab youth get news on Facebook. In the UAE, 33% of people between ages 18 and 34 rely on Snapchat daily.

Such grassroots access to news about Arab uprisings, along with the ability to organize dissent, is breaking down the social contract between autocrats and their citizens. Arabs, for example, are demanding the truth about the COVID-19 outbreak. And with the world economy in a recession, many Arabs see the need for openness and transparency to counteract official corruption.

The UAE has enough political dissent that it has jailed dozens of activists. The most notable prisoner is human rights defender Ahmed Mansoor. He is serving 10 years on charges of “insulting the status and prestige of the UAE and its symbols including its leaders.”

The Arab Spring put Middle East leaders on notice that their main threats are internal. Nearly a decade later, young people still aspire to live in prosperity under peaceful democracies. Making pacts with Israel is one way to listen to those aspirations.