Global Peace Index!
Posted: Tue Jun 05, 2007 8:25 am
Was going to chuck this in another thread, but didn't really fit any of the war ones...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Peace_Index
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Peace_Index
Some of the rankings, top 10 and the countries of people here that I can remember, plus a couple of interesting countries:The Economist Intelligence Unit measured countries' peacefulness based on wide range of indicators – 24 in all – including ease of access to "weapons of minor destruction" (guns, small explosives), military expenditure, local corruption, and the level of respect for human rights.
After compiling the Index, the researchers examined it for patterns in order to identify the "drivers" that make for peaceful societies as measured by the index. They found that peaceful countries often shared high levels of democracy and transparency of government, education and material well-being. While the U.S. possesses many of these characteristics, its ranking was brought down by its engagement in warfare and external conflict, as well as high levels of incarceration and homicide. The U.S.'s rank also suffered due to the large share of military expenditure from its GDP, attributed to its status as one of the world's military-diplomatic powers.
The main findings of the Global Peace Index are:
Peace correlated to indicators such as income, schooling and the level of regional integration
Peaceful countries often shared high levels of transparency of government and low corruption
Small, stable countries which are part of regional blocks are most likely to get a higher ranking
Code: Select all
Rank Country Score
1 Norway 1.357
2 New Zealand 1.363
3 Denmark 1.377
4 Ireland 1.396
5 Japan 1.413
6 Finland 1.447
7 Sweden 1.478
8 Canada 1.481
9 Portugal 1.481
10 Austria 1.483
12 Germany 1.523
25 Australia 1.664
26 Romania 1.682
34 France 1.729
49 United Kingdom 1.898
83 Brazil 2.173
96 USA 2.317
97 Iran 2.320
118 Russia 2.903
119 Israel 3.033
120 Sudan 3.182
121 Iraq 3.437