Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

The authors report on the latest version of the worldwide governance indicators, covering 213 countries and territories and measuring six dimensions of governance from 1996 until end-2005: voice and accountability, political stability and absence of violence, government effectiveness, regulatory quality, rule of law, and control of corruption. The latest indicators are based on hundreds of variables and reflect the views of thousands of citizen and firm survey respondents and experts worldwide. Although global averages of governance display no marked trends during 1996-2005, nearly one-third of countries exhibit significant changes [for better or for worse] on at least one dimension of governance. Three new features distinguish this update. (1) The authors have moved to annual reporting of governance estimates. This update includes new governance estimates for 2003 and 2005, as well as minor backward revisions to biannual historical data for 1996-2004. (2) The authors are, for the first time, publishing the individual measures of governance from virtually every data source underlying the aggregate governance indicators. The ready availability of the individual data sources underlying the aggregate governance indicators is aimed at further enhancing the transparency of the methodology and of the resulting aggregate indicators, as well as helping data users and policymakers identify specific governance challenges in individual countries. (3) The authors present new evidence on the reliability of expert assessments of governance which, alongside survey responses, form part of the aggregate measures of governance.

Accountability --- Aggregate Governance Indicators --- Aggregate Indicators --- Citizen --- Corruption --- Governance --- Governance Challenges --- Governance Indicators --- Government Effectiveness --- Institutions --- Measurement --- Measurement Error --- Measuring Governance --- National Governance --- Political Stability --- Regulatory Quality --- Rule Of Law --- Statistical Methodology --- Transparency --- Unobserved Components Model --- Worldwide Governance Indicators

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

This paper summarizes the methodology of the Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) project, and related analytical issues. The WGI cover over 200 countries and territories, measuring six dimensions of governance starting in 1996: Voice and Accountability, Political Stability and Absence of Violence/Terrorism, Government Effectiveness, Regulatory Quality, Rule of Law, and Control of Corruption. The aggregate indicators are based on several hundred individual underlying variables, taken from a wide variety of existing data sources. The data reflect the views on governance of survey respondents and public, private, and NGO sector experts worldwide. The WGI also explicitly report margins of error accompanying each country estimate. These reflect the inherent difficulties in measuring governance using any kind of data. Even after taking these margins of error into account, the WGI permit meaningful cross-country and over-time comparisons. The aggregate indicators, together with the disaggregated underlying source data, are available at www.govindicators.org.

Accountability --- Aggregate indicator --- Aggregate indicators --- Composite indicators --- Corruption --- Corruption perceptions --- Country estimate --- Economic Policy --- Good governance --- Governance --- Governance Indicators --- Government effectiveness --- Institutional quality --- Institutions and Governance --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- Measuring governance --- National Governance --- Non governmental organizations --- Political stability --- Public Sector Corruption & Anticorruption Measures --- Public Sector Development --- Public sector management --- Regulatory quality --- Rule of law --- Science and Technology Development --- Statistical & Mathematical Sciences --- Statistical methodology --- Transparency --- Unobserved components model --- Worldwide governance indicators