Denmark finished top of the global pile in this year’s Rule of Law index published by the World Justice Project, an independent organisation advocating the advancement of rule of law around the world.
Denmark finished in the top 10 in all nine categories and ranked number one overall closely followed by Norway and Sweden.
The index ranks 99 nations based on 47 indicators organised around nine themes that have been identified as being essential for a functioning society based on the rule of law such as ‘constraints on government powers’, ‘absence of corruption’, ‘open government’, ‘fundamental rights’, ‘civil justice’, ‘order and security’, ‘regulatory enforcement’ and ‘criminal justice’.
“Denmark attains the first position overall as a result of its continuous strong performance across all dimensions," the index report found.
"The country is the world leader in two dimensions – government accountability and absence of corruption – and places in the top five in all other dimensions. Denmark’s public institutions are transparent, efficient and free of corruption.”
Denmark scored 0.88 overall out of 1.00 and finished first in the two themes ‘constraints on government powers’ and ‘absence of corruption’, while ranking second in ‘fundamental rights’ and ‘regulatory enforcement’.
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Still issues to work on
Despite Denmark’s high ranking, there are still issues that need to be looked at, including the discrimination of foreigners.
“The country is relatively safe from crime, and the criminal justice system is effective in bringing offenders to justice; however, police discrimination against foreigners and ethnic minorities are perceived to be a problem. Court delays are also an area where improvement is needed,” the report said.
Norway finished with a score of 0.88 as well, while Sweden was slightly lower at 0.85. Other scores of note were the United Kingdom at 0.78, the United Sates at 0.71, Russia at 0.45, China at 0.45, Brazil at 0.54, India at 0.48 and Australia at 0.80.
The bottom three were Zimbabwe, Afghanistan and Venezuela, which scored a 0.31 in last place. See the entire report here and the country profiles here (both in English).
