The 2025 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to María Corina Machado, who has devoted her life to building community and civic practice, and to defending democracy in Venezuela. Since 1999, Venezuela has seen its democracy under attack from the top—with first Hugo Chavez and now Nicholas Maduro refusing to recognize the rights of their people or the vital importance of dissent and of an open contest of ideas.

There is a reason public officials in the United States swear a legally binding oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution: If they did not, it might be possible to argue that somehow their own opinions, interests, and factional loyalties could constitute a higher responsibility. The oath is to the Constitution, not to their ideas, their own interests, or to the interests of any faction, to the detriment of others.

Legitimacy in government comes from the consent of the governed and from the officials’ subservience to Constitutional law and to the human rights of all people. Any deviation from that standard delegitimizes resulting government action.

Ms. Machado has campaigned for the rights of the Venezuelan people, even when the regime persecuted her as a result. She has organized community efforts to build support for local solutions, to rally citizens to the cause of free and fair elections, to turn out the vote, and to build the non-ideological coalition needed to counter an authoritarian regime.

By giving the 2025 Peace Prize to María Corina Machado, the Norwegian Nobel Committee has issued a clear statement to citizens and to regimes around the world: Legitimacy comes from being a servant of your people’s human rights, and from putting the integrity of democratic process above your own lust for power.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee recognized, in its announcement of the award:

Democracy is a precondition for lasting peace. However, we live in a world where democracy is in retreat, where more and more authoritarian regimes are challenging norms and resorting to violence. The Venezuelan regime’s rigid hold on power and its repression of the population are not unique in the world. We see the same trends globally: rule of law abused by those in control, free media silenced, critics imprisoned, and societies pushed towards authoritarian rule and militarisation. In 2024, more elections were held than ever before, but fewer and fewer are free and fair.

The announcement continues:

In its long history, the Norwegian Nobel Committee has honoured brave women and men who have stood up to repression, who have carried the hope of freedom in prison cells, on the streets and in public squares, and who have shown by their actions that peaceful resistance can change the world. In the past year, Ms Machado has been forced to live in hiding. Despite serious threats against her life she has remained in the country, a choice that has inspired millions of people.

At The Faithful Citizen, we celebrate this recognition of the need for democracy defenders to be instruments of peace both within their countries and in relations between countries. No one is free unless basic human rights are universally acknowledged and upheld.