First of all, of course Democracy has nothing to do with any supposed "absolute defense of freedom", because it is a system of attribution of power, involving coercion - because a fine line separates balance of interests ("politics") and actual coercion. So, of course, if one empowered inadequate individuals the rules will be absurd and damaging - and this has been actually happening, and it is not surprising at all to an etiologic analysis.
But second, soon after Hammurabi started his reign in minus 1792 of the typical timescale, already since the framework established those many millennia ago power is limited - constitutionalism is very old. So, not only it is already well established that some will be empowered, it is also well established that they will not be fully empowered.
There is no lesson that, in general, "power limits freedom": there is full evidence that the current systems need much more R&D. To note that, you already had e.g. gerrymandering, which is very graphic, or the failures in quality citizenship development - kind of the opposite of the hopeful depiction in "12 Angry Men" - which is very pervading.
> But perhaps the most frightening way in which the COVID-19 crisis could
> undermine democracy is by reducing popular confidence in the democratic
> model.
Preliminarily: the article in the Harvard Political Review seems to equate Democracy and Freedom, but that it is just a perspectual effect: it is substantially equating autocracies and _arbitrary_ limitation of freedom. (Which, in the context you propose, should be compared to "_clumsy_ limitation of freedom", plotting data in the two dimensions of malice and stupidity.)
When the article mentions that risk of «reducing popular confidence in the democratic model», it clearly indicates it as an hysterical response, suggesting literally the possibility of «apparent [only] success» increase on the side of autocracies. The whole sub-context reinforces the evidence that Democracy requires, as a foundation, curbing the roots and risks of phenomena like hysterical responses - there is a systemic matter about the care for the roots enabling Democracy, a matter which the article notes in terms like those stating an «already declining state of global democracy». If there is a risk that some may think "ah but an iron fist would solve it" (oversimplifications, "silver bullets" - populism), then you have a problem, gravely impacting Democracy, that you have to solve through Education.
The contextual opposite of the caused damage, of arbitrary measures, is not a "freedom to", but a "freedom from" - freedom from the absurd. This requires proper maintenance of the system. That requires proper information subsystems, with special regard to investigative journalism. That is to be free to live in a well working and fair system - a specific form of Freedom.
