Country profile
Moldova
Republica Moldova
Europe · Eastern Europe
MD · MDA
- Capital
- Chișinău
- Population
- 2,749,076
- Area
- 33,847 km²
- Democracy index
- 72
- Regime type
- Fragmented Democracy
Events
Ballots from Moldova
The latest elections, referendums, and opinion polls from Moldova. Community totals are not official results.
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Classification
Democracy profile
The score and regime label are assigned by Porto Voto using our in-house democracy index and classification framework, not ratings from governments or external agencies.
Democracy index
72/100
Regime type
Fragmented Democracy
Moldova functions as a competitive multi party democracy, a status solidified by the September 2025 parliamentary elections where the pro European Action and Solidarity Party retained its governing majority despite losing some seats to opposition coalitions. The country continues to display robust electoral contestation, a generally free media landscape, and a high degree of public participation. However, the democratic framework strains under massive external security pressures and pervasive hybrid threats, primarily involving large scale illicit funding networks designed to destabilize electoral processes. While the executive leadership under President Maia Sandu maintains a clear commitment to judicial reforms and European integration, the institutional framework suffers from persistent polarization, deep structural vulnerabilities within the rule of law apparatus, and low transparency in public administration, preventing the country from reaching full democratic stability.
Last evaluation:
How we classify regimes →World Factbook
Country background
A concise introduction to Moldova, together with notes on how power and law are organized, to put local ballots in context.
A large portion of present-day Moldovan territory became a province of the Russian Empire in 1812 and then unified with Romania in 1918 in the aftermath of World War I. This territory was then incorporated into the Soviet Union at the close of World War II. Although Moldova has been independent from the Soviet Union since 1991, Russian forces have remained on Moldovan territory east of the Nistru River in the breakaway region of Transnistria.
Years of Communist Party rule in Moldova from 2001 to 2009 ultimately ended with election-related violent protests and a rerun of parliamentary elections in 2009. A series of pro-Europe ruling coalitions governed Moldova from 2010 to 2019, but pro-Russia candidate Igor DODON won the presidency in 2016, and his Socialist Party of the Republic of Moldova won a plurality in the legislative election in 2019. Pro-EU reformist candidate Maia SANDU defeated DODON in his reelection bid in 2020, and SANDU's Party of Action and Solidarity won a parliamentary majority in an early legislative election in 2021.
Prime Minister Natalia GAVRILITA and her cabinet took office in 2021. In early 2023, Moldova's parliament confirmed a new cabinet led by Prime Minister Dorin RECEAN, which retained the majority of the former ministers.