BEIJING, March 31 (Xinhua) -- The so-called "Summit for Democracy" co-hosted by the United States was held Tuesday through Thursday when concerns about democratic backsliding are rising in participating countries.

 

At a time when the world yearns for unity, many experts and analysts see the summit as America's attempt to spread its false narrative of "democracy" which is not based on genuine dialogue but sheer manipulation.

 

A perspective mentioned a lot is that the United States is in no position to define the nature of democracy.

 

It cannot be the only judge of democracy, as there are different forms of democracy in the world and the American standard of democracy is not the only one that exists, Marinko Ogorec, a Croatian political analyst, told Xinhua in an interview.

 

"The basic principle of democracy is not to impose your model and your social values on others," he noted, adding that different forms of democracy should be respected just like different values and traditions and that "only when we respect those differences can we talk about democracy."

 

Some say that in the United States, democracy is not about the welfare of the people but a political tool. "American democracy has been deteriorating, and as you say, backsliding over the past decades," said Herman Tiu Laurel, founder of Philippine BRICS Strategic Studies.

 

Elections have become a very divisive factor, said Laurel, noting that the electoral and so-called democratic process has degenerated into two parties fighting each other.

 

"There is never a compromise, a real compromise, because each party wants to stay in power or grab power so that they can enjoy the economic and financial bonanza from being in power ... So it is no longer about the welfare of the people," he said.

 

According to an expert on international relations in Guinea-Bissau, Americans have no human rights lessons to give to Africa. The country "still can't solve the problem of racism and police blunders which have become a sad reality for the Black population of the country," said Antonio Nhaga, general director of the journal The Democracy.

 

Nhaga said that the "paradigm of democracy" declared by the United States is a "blow of pressure on certain countries" because Westerners have always wanted to impose "their vision of democracy on the world."

 

While troubled by its chaotic internal affairs, the United States is by no means democratic when it comes to its hegemony-based foreign policy, an Egyptian expert said.

 

"The West is schizophrenic when it comes to democracy," Mokhtar Ghobashy, deputy chairman of the Cairo-based Arab Center for Political and Strategic Studies, said in an interview with Xinhua.

 

The West in general and the United States in particular claim to be advocating democracy and rights in some countries as a pretext to pressure them for political purposes, the expert said, citing Washington's responsibility for the disorders and conflicts in some parts of the world, including the ongoing Ukraine crisis.