TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan is the most democratic country in Asia and the 10th most democratic in the world, as seen in the latest graphic representations by market research group Visual Capitalist.
In its report titled "The State of Democracy Around the World" released on April 24 and based on the Economist Intelligence Unit's (EIU's) latest Democracy Index Report, Norway was listed as the most democratic country in the world with a score of 9.81, followed by New Zealand at 9.61, Iceland at 9.52, Sweden at 9.39, Finland at 9.29, Denmark at 9.28, Switzerland at 9.14, Ireland at 9.13, the Netherlands at 9.0, and Taiwan in 10th place in the world at 8.99. This means that Taiwan was the most democratic country in Asia, with economic rivals Japan and South Korea trailing behind at 8.33 and 8.03, respectively.
In the East Asia and Oceania category, Taiwan came in second, trailing only New Zealand. In last place was Myanmar with a score of 0.74. North Korea, Laos, and China also scored poorly with extremely low scores of 1.08, 1.77, and 1.94, respectively.
The online publisher pointed out that the EIU's global Democracy Index score improved slightly in 2022, but "remains at its second lowest point since tracking began in 2006." It cited EIU report as stating that only 8% of the world's people dwell in a "full, functioning democracy."
Some 37% of the world's population live under a "flawed democracy," while 55% of the planet's people live in countries that are completely undemocratic. The report cited the war in Ukraine and the pandemic as major factors eroding democracy and pointed out that the global average has plummeted from 5.52 to 5.29 since it started tracking democracies in 2006.
The EIU ranks countries based on 60 indicators in five major categories: electoral process and pluralism, political culture, political participation, functioning of government, and civil liberties. Each category has a maximum score of 10 based on the performance of the indicators and the final democracy score is the average of the five categories.