This map shows the Global Peace Index (GPI) rankings for the 158 countries around the world in indicators covering crime, terrorism, government, democracy and respect for human rights. A lower score indicates a more peaceful country.
Note: The 2011 GPI included only 153 countries while the 2012 edition includes 158 countries, which affects changes in ranking between 2011 and 2012.
Key Findings of 2012:
For the sixth consecutive year, Western Europe remains markedly the most peaceful region with the majority of its countries ranking in the top 20. The Asia Pacific region’s overall score improved by the largest margin over the 2011-2012 period.
- World becomes slightly more peaceful in the last year - bucking a two-year trend.
- Sub-Saharan Africa for the first time is not the least peaceful region.
- Iceland is the country most at peace for the second successive year.
- Syria tumbles by largest margin dropping over 30 places to 147th position.
- Somalia remains world's least peaceful nation for second year running.
- End of civil war sees Sri Lanka as biggest riser, leaping nearly 30 places.
- Sub-Saharan Africa's levels of peacefulness have increased steadily since 2007 with improvements in 'Relationships with neighbouring nations', 'Availability of small arms and light weapons', and ‘Number of deaths from internal conflict'.
- North America experienced a slight improvement, continuing a trend since 2007.
- Latin America also experienced an overall gain in peacefulness, with 16 of the 23 nations seeing improvements to their GPI scores since 2011.
What is Global Peace Index?
The Global Peace Index (GPI), the first ever study to rank the nations of the world by their peacefulness and to identify potential drivers of peace, is a core asset of the Institute. It is maintained by the Institute for Economics and Peace and developed in consultation with an international panel of peace experts from peace institutes and think tanks with data collected and analysed by the Economist Intelligence Unit.
How is the Peace Index calculated?
The Global Peace Index is calculated on the basis of 23 indicators (see the list below) of the existence or absence of peace were chosen by the panel of experts, which are divided into three broad categories: measures of ongoing domestic and international conflict, measures of safety and security in society and measures of militarization. All scores for each indicator have now been “banded”, either on a scale of 1-5 (for qualitative indicators) or 1-10 (for quantitative data, such as military expenditure or the jailed population, which have then been converted to a 1-5 scale for comparability when compiling the final index). Qualitative indicators in the index have been scored by the Economist Intelligence Unit’s extensive team of country analysts, and gaps in the quantitative data have been filled by estimates by the same team.
- Measures of ongoing domestic and international conflict
- Number of external and internal conflicts fought: 2004-09
- Estimated number of deaths from organized conflict (external)
- Number of deaths from organized conflict (internal)
- Level of organized conflict (internal)
- Relations with neighbouring countries
- Measures of societal safety and security
- Perceptions of criminality in society
- Number of displaced people as a percentage of the population
- Political instability
- Level of disrespect for human rights (Political Terror Scale)
- Potential for terrorist acts
- Number of homicides per 100,000 people
- Level of violent crime
- Likelihood of violent demonstrations
- Number of jailed population per 100,000 people
- Number of internal security officers and police per 100,000 people
- Measures of militarization
- Military expenditure as a percentage of GDP
- Number of armed services personnel per 100,000 people
- Volume of transfers (imports) of major conventional weapons per 100,000 people
- Volume of transfers (exports) of major conventional weapons per 100,000 people
- Funding for UN peacekeeping missions: outstanding contributions versus annual assessment to the budget of the current peacekeeping missions
- Aggregate number of heavy weapons per 100,000 people
- Ease of access to small arms and light weapons
- Military capability/sophistication
Updated: for 2012 (12th June 2012)
11 months ago
