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World Indices

This is a collection of country level indices covering development, governance, and public health.

This data is available in CSV and GeoJSON formats.

Polygons

Natural Earth. 2022. Admin 0 - Countries, version 5.0.0. Accessed 5 February 2022. https://www.naturalearthdata.com/downloads/10m-cultural-vectors/.

Identifiers

Human Development Index

The Human Development Index (HDI) from the UN is a summary measure of average achievement in key dimensions of human development: a long and healthy life, being knowledgeable and have a decent standard of living. The HDI is the geometric mean of normalized indices for each of the three dimensions: life expectancy, education, and GNI per capita.

The variables sourced from the UN include:

United Nations Development Program. 2022. Human Development Index (HDI). Accessed 7 January 2024. https://hdr.undp.org/en/content/download-data.

Transparency International

The Transparency International ranks 180 countries and territories around the world by their perceived levels of public sector corruption.

Transparency International. 2024. 2022 Corruption Perceptions Index. Accessed 7 January 2024. https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022.

World Happiness Report

"The World Happiness Report is a publication of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, powered by data from the Gallup World Poll and Lloyd’s Register Foundation, who provided access to the World Risk Poll." It is the continuation of the idea of gross national happiness conceptualized by King Jigme Singye Wangchuck of Bhutan in 1972.

Helliwell, John F., Richard Layard, Jeffrey Sachs, Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, Lara B. Aknin, Shun Wang, and Sharon Paculor, eds. 2023. World Happiness Report 2023. New York: Sustainable Development Solutions Network. https://worldhappiness.report/.

Wellbeing Economy Alliance

"The Happy Planet Index is a measure of sustainable wellbeing, ranking countries by how efficiently they deliver long, happy lives using our limited environmental resources."

Wellbeing Economy Alliance. 2022. Happy Planet Index. https://happyplanetindex.org/.

Freedom in the World Report

"The Freedom in the World report is composed of numerical ratings and supporting descriptive texts for 195 countries and 15 territories. External analysts assess 210 countries and territories, using a combination of on-the-ground research, consultations with local contacts, and information from news articles, nongovernmental organizations, governments, and a variety of other sources. Expert advisers and regional specialists then vet the analysts’ conclusions. The final product represents the consensus of the analysts, advisers, and Freedom House staff."

Freedom House. 2021. Freedom in the World 2021. https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world.

Freedom House. 2023. Freedom in the World 2023. Accessed 7 January 2023. https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world.

Varieties of Democracy

The Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) project provides a multidimensional and disaggregated dataset based on five high-level principles of democracy: electoral, liberal, participatory, deliberative, and egalitarian.

V-Dem Institute. 2023. "Democracy Report 2023." https://www.v-dem.net/publications/democracy-reports/. Accessed 8 January 2024.

Atlas of Impunity

Impunity is "the exercise of power without accountability, which becomes, in its starkest form, the commission of crimes without punishment. "

"The Atlas of Impunity is a quantitative assessment of this holistic definition of impunity, measured by independent indicators across five sites in society. These dimensions include unaccountable governance, human rights abuse, conflict and violence, economic exploitation, and environmental degradation."

eurasiagroup. 2023. "The Atlas of Impunity." Accessed 19 January 2024. https://www.eurasiagroup.net/live-post/atlas-of-impunity-2023

Index of Economic Freedom

The Heritage Foundation is a conservative Washington DC based think-tank founded in 1973 with a mission "to formulate and promote public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense."

Each of the twelve economic freedoms within the following categories are graded on a scale of 0 to 100. A country’s overall score is derived by averaging these twelve economic freedoms, with equal weight being given to each.

The Heritage Foundation. 2023. 2023 Index of Economic Freedom. Accessed 7 January 2024. https://www.heritage.org/index/ranking.

The Heritage Foundation. 2021. 2021 Index of Economic Freedom. https://www.heritage.org/index/ranking.

STC Health Index

The STC Health Index evaluates countries on a scale of zero (worst) to one (best) based on a variety of health metrics, including life expectancy, health care access, sanitation, health conditions, and food security.

Stephane Tajick Consulting. 2021. The 2021 STC Health Index. https://globalresidenceindex.com/hnwi-index/health-index/.

Legatum Institute

The Legatum Institute is a London-based think-tank with a bold vision to create a global movement of people committed to creating the pathways from poverty to prosperity and the transformation of society.

The Legatum Institute. 2021. The Legatum Prosperity Index™ 2021. https://www.prosperity.com/rankings.

Colonialism

These are three values from a compendium of data on European colonialsm of the Global South up through the middle 20th century.

Ziltener, P., Künzler, D., and Walter, A. 2017. Research Note: Measuring the Impacts of Colonialism: A New Data Set for the Countries of Africa and Asia. Journal of World-Systems Research, 23(1), 156-190. https://doi.org/10.5195/jwsr.2017.683.

Appendix: Python Code to Create the GeoJSON File from CSV

import geopandas
import pandas
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

csv = pandas.read_csv("2023-world-indices.csv")

countries = geopandas.read_file("https://michaelminn.net/tutorials/data/2023-natural-earth-countries.geojson")

countries = countries[["ISO_A3", "geometry"]]

countries = countries.rename(columns={"ISO_A3": "ISO3"})

countries = countries.merge(csv, how="left")

axis = countries.plot("Human Development Index", scheme="quantiles", cmap="coolwarm_r",
	legend=True, legend_kwds={"bbox_to_anchor":(0.3, 0.3)})

axis.set_axis_off()

plt.show()

countries.to_file("2023-world-indices.geojson")