Human Freedom Index
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This article contains a list of freedom indices produced by several
non-governmental organization A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see American and British English spelling differences#-ise, -ize (-isation, -ization), spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from g ...
s that publish and maintain assessments of the state of freedom in the world, according to their own various definitions of the term, and rank countries as being free, partly free, or using various measures of freedom, including civil liberties, political rights and economic rights.


Prominent indices

The indices and their origins: *
Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
** The Economic Freedom of the World Index is a report published by Canada-based
Fraser Institute The Fraser Institute is a libertarian-conservative Canadian public policy think tank and registered charity. The institute describes itself as independent and non-partisan. It is headquartered in Vancouver, with additional offices in Calgary, T ...
in conjunction with the Economic Freedom Network, a group of independent research and educational institutes in 90 nations and territories worldwide. It is a numeric index, and its results are not currently included in the table below. *
Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
,
United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
,
Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
** The Human Freedom Index presents the state of human freedom in the world based on a broad measure that encompasses personal, civil, and economic freedom. The index presents a broad measure of human freedom, understood as the absence of coercive constraint. It uses 79 distinct indicators of personal and economic freedom. The index covers the following areas: Rule of Law, Security and Safety, Movement, Religion, Association, Assembly, Civil Society, Expression, Relationships, Size of Government, Legal System and Property Rights, Access to Sound Money, Freedom to Trade Internationally, and Regulation of Credit, Labor, and Business. The Human Freedom Index was created in 2015, covering 152 countries for years 2008–2012. The Human Freedom Index 2016 was published in November 2016, covering 159 countries for years 2008–2015. The report is co-published by the
Cato Institute The Cato Institute is an American libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Ed Crane, Murray Rothbard, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Koch Industries.Koch Ind ...
, the
Fraser Institute The Fraser Institute is a libertarian-conservative Canadian public policy think tank and registered charity. The institute describes itself as independent and non-partisan. It is headquartered in Vancouver, with additional offices in Calgary, T ...
, and the Liberales Institut at the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom. Co-authors of the report are Ian Vásquez and Tanja Porčnik. ** The
Index of Freedom in the World Index (or its plural form indices) may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional entities * Index (''A Certain Magical Index''), a character in the light novel series ''A Certain Magical Index'' * The Index, an item on a Halo megastru ...
was a predecessor to the Human Freedom Index. It measured classical civil liberties and was published in 2013 by Canada's
Fraser Institute The Fraser Institute is a libertarian-conservative Canadian public policy think tank and registered charity. The institute describes itself as independent and non-partisan. It is headquartered in Vancouver, with additional offices in Calgary, T ...
, Germany's Liberales Institute, and the U.S.
Cato Institute The Cato Institute is an American libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Ed Crane, Murray Rothbard, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Koch Industries.Koch Ind ...
. It is not currently included in the table below. *
France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...
** Worldwide Press Freedom Index, is published each year since 2002 (except that 2011 was combined with 2012) by France-based Reporters Without Borders. Countries are assessed as having a ''good situation'', a ''satisfactory situation'', ''noticeable problems'', a ''difficult situation'', or a ''very serious situation''. *
Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...
** The World Index of Moral Freedom was first published on 2 April 2016, by the Foundation for the Advancement of Liberty, based in
Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the Largest cities of the Europ ...
,
Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...
. This index ranks 160 countries by five categories of indicators: religious freedom, bioethical freedom, drugs freedom, sexuality freedom and family and gender freedom. The index aims at establishing the degree of individual freedom or state control on decisions pertaining to the great moral debates of our time. * Sweden **MaxRange, developed by Max Rånge, and maintained by Mikael Sandberg and Max Rånge, political scientists at Halmstad University, Sweden, is a data set defining a country's level of democracy and institutional structure (regime-type) on a 1000-point graded scale. Values are sorted based on level of democracy and political accountability. MaxRange defines the value corresponding to all states every month from 1789 to the present. ** Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Institute, the V-Dem Institute, the Department of Political Science at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, is an approach to conceptualizing and measuring democracy. It provides a multidimensional and disaggregated dataset that reflects the complexity of the concept of democracy as a system of rule that goes beyond the simple presence of elections. The V-Dem project distinguishes between five high-level principles of democracy: electoral, liberal, participatory, deliberative, and egalitarian, and collects data to measure these principles. With six principal investigators (PIs), seventeen project managers (PMs) with special responsibility for issue areas, more than thirty regional managers (RMs), 170 country coordinators (CCs), research assistants, and 3,000 country experts (CEs), the V-Dem project is one of the largest social science data collection projects focusing on research. * Switzerland **
Global Corruption Index Global means of or referring to a globe and may also refer to: Entertainment * ''Global'' (Paul van Dyk album), 2003 * ''Global'' (Bunji Garlin album), 2007 * ''Global'' (Humanoid album), 1989 * ''Global'' (Todd Rundgren album), 2015 * Bruno ...
, rates and ranks countries by a metric that measures the risk of corruption in the country by using 43 variables. It covers 196 countries and territories and is published by the Swiss-based company, Global Risk Profile. * UK ** The
Democracy Index The ''Democracy Index'' is an index compiled by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), the research division of the Economist Group, a UK-based private company which publishes the weekly newspaper ''The Economist''. Akin to a Human Development I ...
, published by the UK-based
Economist Intelligence Unit The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) is the research and analysis division of the Economist Group, providing forecasting and advisory services through research and analysis, such as monthly country reports, five-year country economic forecasts, ...
, is an assessment of countries' democracy. Countries are rated as ''full democracies'', ''flawed democracies'', ''hybrid regimes'', or ''authoritarian regimes''. The index is based on 60 indicators grouped in five different categories measuring pluralism, civil liberties, and political culture. * US ** The
CIRI Human Rights Data Project From 2004 to 2014, the Cingranelli-Richards (CIRI) Human Rights Data Project annually rated the level of government respect for a variety of internationally recognized human rights. The final CIRI data set contains quantitative indicators of 15 huma ...
measures a range of human, civil, women's, and workers' rights. It was created in 1994 and is now hosted by the
University of Connecticut The University of Connecticut (UConn) is a public land-grant research university in Storrs, Connecticut, a village in the town of Mansfield. The primary 4,400-acre (17.8 km2) campus is in Storrs, approximately a half hour's drive from H ...
. In its 2011 report, the U.S. was ranked 38th in overall human rights. **
Freedom in the World ''Freedom in the World'' is a yearly survey and report by the U.S.-based non-governmental organization Freedom House that measures the degree of civil liberties and political rights in every nation and significant related and disputed territori ...
, published each year since 1972 by the U.S.-based Freedom House, ranks countries by political rights and civil liberties that are derived in large measure from the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is an international document adopted by the United Nations General Assembly that enshrines the rights and freedoms of all human beings. Drafted by a UN committee chaired by Eleanor Roosevelt, ...
. Countries are assessed as ''free'', ''partly free'', or ''unfree''. ** Freedom of the Press is a report published each year since 1980 by Freedom House. ** The Index of Economic Freedom is an annual report published by
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
and the U.S.-based
Heritage Foundation The Heritage Foundation (abbreviated to Heritage) is an American conservative think tank based in Washington, D.C. that is primarily geared toward public policy. The foundation took a leading role in the conservative movement during the preside ...
. Countries are assessed as ''free'', ''mostly free'', ''moderately free'', ''mostly unfree'', and ''repressed''. ** The U.S.-based
Polity data series The Polity data series is a data series in political science research. Along with the Varieties of Democracy project and Freedom House, Polity is among prominent datasets that measure democracy and autocracy. The Polity study was initiated i ...
is a widely used data series in
political science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...
research. It contains coded annual information on regime authority characteristics and transitions for all independent states with total populations greater than 500,000 and covers the years 1800–2018. Polity's conclusions about a state's level of democracy are based on an evaluation of that state's elections for competitiveness, openness, and level of participation. Data from this series is not currently included in the table below. The Polity work is sponsored by the
Political Instability Task Force The Political Instability Task Force (PITF), formerly known as State Failure Task Force, is a Federal government of the United States, U.S. government-sponsored research project to build a database on major domestic politics, political conflicts le ...
(PITF) which is funded by the U.S.
Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...
; however, the views expressed in the reports are the authors' alone and do not represent the views of the U.S. Government.


Annual assessments

Here is a table of the assessments by four indices, for most countries of the world. For exact rankings rather than assessments, refer to the individual index articles. File:2021 Freedom House world map.png, Country ratings from Freedom House's '' Freedom in the World 2021'' survey File:Index of Economic Freedom 2021.svg, 2021 Index of Economic Freedom.
Source:
Heritage Foundation The Heritage Foundation (abbreviated to Heritage) is an American conservative think tank based in Washington, D.C. that is primarily geared toward public policy. The foundation took a leading role in the conservative movement during the preside ...
and the
Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
File:Press freedom 2022.svg, Press freedom in 2022 according to Reporters Without Borders File:Democracy Index 2020.svg, Democracy Index map in 2020 according to
The Economist Intelligence Unit The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) is the research and analysis division of the Economist Group, providing forecasting and advisory services through research and analysis, such as monthly country reports, five-year country economic forecasts, ...


List by country


Disputed territories


See also

*
Democracy-Dictatorship Index Democracy-Dictatorship (DD), index of democracy and dictatorship or simply the DD index or the DD datasets refers to the binary measure of democracy and dictatorship first proposed by Adam Przeworski ''et al.'' (2010), and further developed a ...
* ''
Areopagitica ''Areopagitica; A speech of Mr. John Milton for the Liberty of Unlicenc'd Printing, to the Parlament of England'' is a 1644 prose polemic by the English poet, scholar, and polemical author John Milton opposing licensing and censorship. ''Are ...
'', writing by John Milton on the liberty of unlicensed printing to the Parliament of England *
Censorship by country Censorship by country collects information on censorship, Internet censorship, freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and human rights by country and presents it in a sortable table, together with links to articles with more information. In add ...
* Corruption Perceptions Index *
Ease of doing business index The ease of doing business index was an index created jointly by Simeon Djankov, Michael Klein, and Caralee McLiesh, three leading economists at the World Bank Group. The academic research for the report was done jointly with professors Edward ...
* Freedom House *
Freedom in the World ''Freedom in the World'' is a yearly survey and report by the U.S.-based non-governmental organization Freedom House that measures the degree of civil liberties and political rights in every nation and significant related and disputed territori ...
* Indices of economic freedom *
Internet censorship and surveillance by country This list of Internet censorship and surveillance by country provides information on the types and levels of Internet censorship and surveillance that is occurring in countries around the world. Classifications Detailed country by country informa ...
* Media transparency *
Transparency (behavior) As an ethic that spans science, engineering, business, and the humanities, transparency is operating in such a way that it is easy for others to see what actions are performed. Transparency implies openness, communication, and accountability. Tran ...
* Transparency (market) *
United Nations Parliamentary Assembly A United Nations Parliamentary Assembly (UNPA) is a proposed addition to the United Nations System that would allow for greater participation and voice for members of parliament. The idea was raised at the founding of the League of Nations in ...


Notes and references


External links

* * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Freedom Indices Human rights-related lists Index numbers International rankings