World Governance Index
# World Governance Index

The Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) is a project that reports both aggregate and individual governance indicators for over 200 countries and territories covering the period from 1996 to 2021. It considers six dimensions of governance:

* Voice and Accountability
* Political Stability and Absence of Violence/Terrorism
* Government Effectiveness
* Regulatory Quality
* Rule of Law
* Control of Corruption

These aggregate indicators are based on the views of a large number of enterprise, citizen, and expert survey respondents in both industrial and developing countries. The indicators draw from over 30 individual data sources produced by a variety of survey institutes, think tanks, non-governmental organizations, international organizations, and private sector firms.

The 2022 WGI update includes significant revisions to the underlying source data, which affect the data for earlier years in the WGI dataset. This latest release supersedes previous releases.

## Background

Creating a set of indicators for the World Governance Index (WGI) is a comprehensive and complex process. The objective is to measure a modern concept that, despite its historical roots, is currently applied in certain frameworks and implemented by identified entities. Although there is agreement on diagnosing its challenges, it is still far from being fully "stabilized".

Drawing from the United Nations Millennium Declaration, which was unanimously adopted by heads of state and government in 2000, a team of researchers from the Forum for a new World Governance (FnWG), consisting of Gustavo Marín, Arnaud Blin, and Renaud François, concentrated their research on five core concepts that outline the application framework of world governance and represent key objectives to be achieved by 2015:

* Peace / Security
* Democracy / Rule of Law
* Human Rights / Participation
* Sustainable Development
* Human Development

## What is the purpose of a WGI?

The research team considered its mission with two goals in mind:

* The first was to create a World Governance Index (WGI) providing an overall picture of world governance at time T based on data obtained for the 179 countries included in the survey. The WGI combines 5 indicators, each made up of 13 sub-indicators, each of those made up of 37 indexes. These indexes were selected from among the best available databases. They are all provided by recognized sources, well known for their quality, seriousness, and reliability.

Factors constituting the World Governance Index :

| Indicator | Sub-indicator | Index |
| - | - | - |
| Peace / Security | National Security | Conflicts |
| Peace / Security | National Security | Refugees / Asylum Seekers |
| Peace / Security | National Security | Displaced Persons |
| Peace / Security | Public Security | Political climate |
| Peace / Security | Public Security | Degree of trust |
| Peace / Security | Public Security | Violent Crime |
| Peace / Security | Public Security | Homicides / 100,000 inhabitants |
| Rule of Law | Body of Laws | Ratification of International Treaties |
| Rule of Law | Body of Laws | Protection of Property Rights |
| Rule of Law | Legal System | Independence |
| Rule of Law | Legal System | Effectiveness |
| Rule of Law | Legal System | Settlement of Contractual Disputes |
| Rule of Law | Corruption | Corruption Perceptions Index |
| Human Rights / Participation | Civil and Political Rights | Respect of Civil Rights |
| Human Rights / Participation | Civil and Political Rights | Respect of Physical Integrity Rights |
| Human Rights / Participation | Civil and Political Rights | Freedom of the Press |
| Human Rights / Participation | Civil and Political Rights | Violence against the Press |
| Human Rights / Participation | Participation | Participation in Political Life |
| Human Rights / Participation | Participation | Electoral Process and Pluralism |
| Human Rights / Participation | Participation | Political Culture |
| Human Rights / Participation | Discrimination / Gender Inequalities | Women's Political Rights |
| Human Rights / Participation | Discrimination / Gender Inequalities | Women's Social Rights |
| Human Rights / Participation | Discrimination / Gender Inequalities | Women's Economic Rights |
| Human Rights / Participation | Discrimination / Gender Inequalities | Female Parliamentary Rate |
| Sustainable Development | Economic Sector | Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita |
| Sustainable Development | Economic Sector | GDP Growth Rate |
| Sustainable Development | Economic Sector | Inflation Rate |
| Sustainable Development | Economic Sector | Ease in starting a business |
| Sustainable Development | Social Dimension | Poverty Rate / Inequalities (Gini Coefficient) |
| Sustainable Development | Social Dimension | Unemployment Rate |
| Sustainable Development | Social Dimension | Ratification of International Labor Law Treaties |
| Sustainable Development | Environmental Dimension | Ecological Footprint / Biocapacity |
| Sustainable Development | Environmental Dimension | Environmental Sustainability |
| Sustainable Development | Environmental Dimension | Environmental Performance Index |
| Human Development | Development | Human Development |
| Human Development | Well-being / Happiness | Subjective Well-being |
| Human Development | Well-being / Happiness | Happiness |

* The second goal is to motivate world-governance actors to consider the resulting WGI and the relative importance of the different indicators. This should allow them to identify the "key" or "pilot" indicators that will set up the conditions for good world governance and, more importantly, guarantee their sustainability. The ultimate goal of this study is part of a long-term process. On the basis of the situation described by the WGI and of its diagnosis, it should allow actors in charge of governance to raise the right questions in order to consider solutions.

## Methodology and databases

The 37 indexes constituting the WGI have been set on a scale from zero to one, a scale similar to the one developed by the United Nations Development Programme for its Human Development Index (HDI).

Although some of the indexes used (only 4 out of the 37) were drawn from databases that had not been updated since 2007, the 2008 World Governance Index nevertheless reflects the state of world governance in 2008.

The regional rankings are inspired from UNDP classification. The 179 countries surveyed in this study —microstates were deliberately not included in this list – were grouped into six regional subgroups:

* Africa
* European Union / OECD
* Latin America / Caribbean
* Asia / Pacific
* Arab World
* NIS / Central Asia / Balkans

## Sources

World Governance Index: PDF document, 81 pages.

