Freedom House Nations in Transit
13.06.2014.
Level of democracy development is compared through a few separated international researches, through a series of indicators in order to estimate the political development of countries in the world. Most frequently used researches are the following: first, the World Bank's periodical research Governance Matters has been available since 1996; second, Freedom House's study Freedoms in the World since 1972, and Nations in Transit study since 1995; and third, Bertelsmann's Transformation Index (BTI), published by Bertlesmann's foundation.
Freedom House is using two indicators of democratic development. First indicator, world freedom (study Freedom in the World, since 1972) is measured throughout the political rights and civil freedoms indexes. According to that study, countries are getting average grades from 1 to 7; where grades from 1 to 2.5 are applied to free countries, 3 to 5 to those partially free, amd 5.5 to 7 to non-free countries.
Other indicators, efficacy of democracy (democracy score), has been measured since 1995 in 29 post-communist countries, and published in the study Nations in Transit.
Efficacy index is measured in seven areas with grades from 1 to 7:
- Electoral process,
- Civil society,
- Media independence,
- Democratic governance,
- Local government,
- Legal framework,
- Corruption.
Democratic order efficacy is calculated based on the average of all grades.
- Consolidated democracies – 1.00 to 2.99
- Half-consolidated democracies – 3.00 to 3.99
- Hybrid regimes – 4.00 to 4.99
- Half-consolidated authoritarian regimes – 5.00 to 5.99
- Consolidated authoritarian regimes – 6.00 to 7.00.
