The Economist’s »Democracy Index« measures and categorizes the state of democracy in 167 countries. According to the index, a full democracy has the following features: free and fair elections, political pluralism, respect of civil liberties and human rights, protection of minority rights, a functioning govern­ment with an effective system of checks and balances, equality before the law and an inde­pendent judiciary as well as free and diverse media. Other regimes are missing these features partly or completely.

How to read the graphic

Each country that is included in the Economist’s index constitutes one slice in the graphic. The countries are ordered by their democracy rank: the further left a country is placed the more democratic it is. The width of the slice illustrates each country's share of world population, land mass, and GDP respectively. China, for example, is home to ~ 19 % of the world’s population, covers ~ 7 % of the planet’s land surface and produces ~ 15 % of the world's total GDP. The colours indicate the categories full democracy, flawed democracy, hybrid regime and authoritarian regime according to the index.

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