In plain sight, Boris Johnson is rigging the system to stay in power | Jonathan Freedland

Weakening the courts, limiting protest, hobbling the elections regulator. If another country did this, what would we call it?

If this wasn't us, how would we describe it? If this was Viktor Orban's Hungary, or Poland, what language might we use? Would an announcer on the BBC World Service declare: Amid fuel and food shortages, the government has moved to cement its grip on power. It's taking action against the courts, shrinking their ability to hold the ruling party to account, curbing citizens' right to protest and imposing new rules that would gag whistleblowers and sharply restrict freedom of the press. It's also moving against election monitors while changing voting rules, which observers say will hurt beleaguered opposition groups ... "

It doesn't sound like us. We like to tell ourselves that we live in a mature democracy, our institutions deep rooted. Political competition is brisk, never more so than at this time of year, as one party conference ends and another begins. This is not a one-party state. All it would require is Labour to get its act together - to which end it made a decent start this week - and, with a fair wind, the Conservatives would be out.

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist