For almost a hundred years, two measurements have been used to get a sense of how well a country is doing. One is GDP, or gross domestic product, the amount a country earns. The other is its unemployment rate. But when it comes to figuring out how well a country is serving its citizens, these tools might not only be incomplete: they may not in fact be that helpful at all.
On estimates of social progress, for example – which measures aspects like access to education, food and affordable housing – poorer countries often outdo their wealthier counterparts. “Broadly, richer countries have higher social progress, so getting more economic growth is not a bad idea,” says Michael Green, CEO of the Social Progress Index. “But what we also find, very clearly, is that social progress is not completely explained by economic variables. GDP is not destiny.
The Social Progress Index is one of a number of indexes that aggregate data about countries worldwide – and about how well those countries are serving their populations. If we come across them at all, we usually see them being used for the kinds of country rankings that make us daydream about a move to Denmark or New Zealand.
Behind the scenes, though, this kind of information is used for much more. It can show surprising relationships that help shape policy. It can determine which countries get help with funding. And it may even be able to help predict the future.
One of the interesting ways these kinds of indexes are used is to see how countries have improved or declined – or just stayed the same.
There are some who argue the US government is less effective than ever, for example; the US public has lower levels of trust in government since almost any time since 1958. But the World Bank’s Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) show that levels of government effectiveness have remained roughly the same every year since 1996. (The measurement analyses outcomes like the condition of highways, primary school quality and the amount of red tape).
Other countries have moved a fair amount. Tunisia, for example, saw a steady decline in voice and accountability, which measures aspects like confidence in elections and freedom of the press, from 1996 to 2010. Then the Arab Spring happened. In 2011, Tunisia jumped from the 9th percentile to the 36th and has grown steadily since then; in 2016, it was on par with Hungary at the 57th percentile. TO READ MORE, CLICK HERE...
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