How a handful measure the world
- Sanjeev SanyalSrishti Chauhan
- TNNUpdated: Jun 15, 2023, 21:14 IST IST
Norms are needed, but data institutes that rank nations must go beyond their tiny North Atlantic clique
The Press Freedom Index released last month by Reporters Without Borders (known by its French acronym RSF) had yet again raised eyebrows with India dropping to a rank of 161 (out of 180 countries) from 150 in 2022. In common with several such opinion-based rankings, this index too stretches credibility by placing India below conflict-ridden countries such as Sudan (148), Pakistan (150) and even Afghanistan (152). This article looks into the source of these systemically biased reports, and shows that it is part of a well-coordinated web of global funding that is deliberately hardwiring certain agendas into the way the world works.
As many readers will have noticed, there has been a spate of perception-based rankings such as V-Dem’s Democracy index, Economist Intelligence Unit’s (EIU) Democracy Index, and Freedom House’s Freedom in the World Index that have been systematically lowering India’s rankings in recent years. Their laughable methodology and blatant biases have been highlighted previously in a working paper titled published in November 2022 by Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister. Several other researchers have also published articles criticising these rankings. The focus of this article, however, is not the first-order biases in methodology but the broader forces that guide such narrative-building.
As many readers will have noticed, there has been a spate of perception-based rankings such as V-Dem’s Democracy index, Economist Intelligence Unit’s (EIU) Democracy Index, and Freedom House’s Freedom in the World Index that have been systematically lowering India’s rankings in recent years. Their laughable methodology and blatant biases have been highlighted previously in a working paper titled published in November 2022 by Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister. Several other researchers have also published articles criticising these rankings. The focus of this article, however, is not the first-order biases in methodology but the broader forces that guide such narrative-building.
