When I first started writing about the Human Freedom Index, Hong Kong was the best jurisdiction in the world. Then New Zealand regularly appeared in the top spot.
In recent years, though, Switzerland has been in first place.
And the world’s best-governed nation retained that position in the most recent edition. Though New Zealand deserves credit for being in second place, followed by Denmark, Ireland, Estonia, and Sweden.
It’s also worth noting that Montenegro had the biggest improvement, jumping 16 spots to rank #42, followed by Bolivia, which jumped 14 spots to rank #79.
But there is plenty of bad news in the Index.
For instance, the average human freedom score has dropped significantly in the past couple of years.
There are no big surprises among the bottom-10 nations.
Last but not least, here’s a list of the worst-performing nations over the past 15 years.
I’m not surprised to see Hong Kong, given the big deterioration in recent years. And it’s worth noting that Hungary has suffered a big decline.
By the way, the score for the United States has dropped by -0.64 since 2000, so it may just be a matter of time before it appears on this type of embarrassing list.
