Measuring Democracy and the Quality of Democracy in a World-Wide Approach

Abstract

The central research question for this article is: How can democracy and the quality of democracy be measured globally and empirically? Certainly, democracy measurement represents a wider research field; however, this article wants to contribute to it by offering to the reader an introduction and by giving first views about the ideas of democracy measurement in a global comparison and worldwide approach. The article contrasts different approaches to the measurement of democracy, with a focus on three macro-models of democracy measurement as well as the democratic indices (indicators) that they apply specifically: Freedom House, Democracy Index and Democracy Ranking. All three initiatives want to measure a large number of democracies over a longer period of time. In conclusion, it could, at least implicitly, be argued for Freedom House: the higher the freedom evaluation of a country, the greater the chances are or the more there is an expectation of a tendency for an advanced quality of democracy.

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Keywords: Democracy, Democracy Index, Democracy Measurement, Freedom House, Global Democracy,
Human Development Index (HDI), Knowledge Democracy, Knowledge Economy, Quadruple
Helix Innovation Systems, Sustainable Development
Measuring Democracy and
the Quality of Democracy in
a World-Wide Approach:
Models and Indices of Democracy and the
New Findings of the “Democracy Ranking”
David F. J. Campbell, Faculty for Interdisciplinary Studies (IFF), Institute of Science
Communication and Higher Education Research (WIHO),University of Klagenfurt, Vienna,
Austria
Elias G. Carayannis, Department of Information Systems and Technology Management, The
George Washington University, School of Business, Washington, DC, USA
Thorsten D. Barth, Vienna Democracy Ranking Association,Vienna, Austria
George S. Campbell, IBM Austria (retired),Vienna, Austria
ABSTRACT
The central research question for this article is: How can democracy and the quality of democracy be measured
globally and empirically? Certainly, democracy measurement represents a wider research eld; however, this
article wants to contribute to it by offering to the reader an introduction and by giving rst views about the
ideas of democracy measurement in a global comparison and world-wide approach. The article contrasts
different approaches to the measurement of democracy, with a focus on three macro-models of democracy
measurement as well as the democratic indices (indicators) that they apply specically: Freedom House,
Democracy Index and Democracy Ranking. All three initiatives want to measure a large number of democra-
cies over a longer period of time. In conclusion, it could, at least implicitly, be argued for Freedom House:
the higher the freedom evaluation of a country, the greater the chances are or the more there is an expectation
of a tendency for an advanced quality of democracy.
DOI: 10.4018/jsesd.2013010101

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1. INTRODUCTION:
DEMOCRACY AND THE
MEASUREMENT OF
DEMOCRACY
Democracy and its qualities are confronted
today by new challenges. On the one hand,
the advanced democracies are in a phase of
transformation from the industrial society to
a knowledge society (see Dubina et al., 2011),
where knowledge or the resources of knowledge
are decisive for the advance and progress of
democracy (see Carayannis & Campbell, 2006,
pp. 3-4; 2010, p. 60; Campbell, 2003; Carayan-
nis & Formica, 2006). On the other hand, crises,
wars, terrorism, national debt, climate change,
resource shortages, or even the citizens’ loss
of trust in politics and policies of democracies
challenge further democratic development (see
Barth, 2010; Barth, 2011, pp. 1-2). Thus, we
see global democracy to be in a phase of radical
change or transformation.
Exactly in phases of radical change or
transformation there need to be new ideas
and perspectives, which help us to seek new
democratic goals and societal solutions for a
permanent and continuous sustainable develop-
ment, in order to secure as well as to preserve
democracy in the present and future (see,
for example, Carayannis & Kaloudis, 2010;
Carayannis & Campbell, 2010; Barth, 2011).
We can only protect democracy, understand
its quality, and react to new challenges, if we
recognize the political standing of our democ-
racy today and tomorrow (see Tilly, 2007, p.
6). This is the decisive relevance of the current
democracy research and therefore requires the
measurement of democracy and democratic
quality (see also Campbell & Schaller, 2002;
Campbell, 2008; Campbell & Barth, 2009).
The central research question of this article
is thus: How can democracy and democratic
quality be measured globally and empirically?
Certainly, the world of democracy measurement
is a wider research field; however, this article
should contribute to it by offering the reader an
introduction and by giving first views about the
ideas of democracy measurement in a global
comparison and world-wide approach. The
results of the Democracy Ranking 2010 are
being presented as an example for the measure-
ment of the quality of democracy. What can be
said about democracy and the measurement of
democracy?
Earlier discussions were more character-
ized by a dichotomous understanding, where
“democracies” were contrasted with “non-
democracies” (see for example Dahl, 1971).
The global expansion of democracies requires
that there is an increased need to distinguish
between different forms of democracies.
Electoral democracies would only fulfill the
minimum expectations for democracies (e.g.,
the regular performance of elections), democra-
cies with a medium or higher quality (relative
to a continuing and expanding extension of
rights and freedoms, perhaps in a mutual effect
with the development of societies), however,
determine important reform topics for the
necessary further development and evolution
of democracies. The question of democracy
gains relevance since it is interesting to com-
prehend the extent of democratic quality. Thus
it is also necessary to add to democracies the
systematic measurement of the quality of
democracy, whereby not every democratic
measurement must refer to democratic quality.
Simpler democracy measurements could em-
phasize how often there is a political change of
government parties (government leaders). The
measurement of democratic quality is already
more complex and could refer therefore to the
balance and interaction of freedom and equality
(see O’Donnell 2004, pp. 56-57; Diamond &
Morlino, 2004, 2005; Morlino, 2004a, 2004b;
Pelinka, 2008). Nevertheless, every measure-
ment of democracy should focus on Abraham
Lincoln’s definition that Guillermo O’Donnell

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paraphrased as: “Contemporary democracy
hardly is by the people; but it certainly is of the
people and, because of this, it should also be for
the people.” (O’Donnell, 2005, p. 9).
This article will contrast at the beginning
different approaches to the measurement of
democracy, with a focus on three “macro-
models” of democracy measurement as well
as the democratic indices (indicators) that they
apply, specifically: Freedom House, Democracy
Index and Democracy Ranking. All three initia-
tives want to measure a possibly large number
of democracies over a longer period of time.
Freedom House represents here certainly the
most important reference model. Democracy
Index and Democracy Ranking are partially
developed in discussion about or in addition to
Freedom House. These three models resulted
from a “western cultural environment”, which
could result in a better evaluation of “western
democracies”. Until now, the authors are not
aware of a comparatively comprehensive
“macro-model” from a non-western cultural
environment. This article follows, therefore,
three investigative questions:
1. How do Freedom House, Democracy In-
dex and Democracy Ranking distinguish
themselves conceptually and methodically
from each other? How plausible are these
macro-models for a global measurement
of democracy (Section 2)?
2. Which empirical measurement results
and which new findings can be found, as
examples, through the Democracy Ranking
initiative of democracy and the quality of
democracy? Here, we place a focus on the
results of the Democracy Ranking 2010
(Section 3)?
3. In the conclusion, we then concentrate on
a more content-based assessment of the
outcome of the Democracy Ranking 2010.
Which conclusions can be drawn from
that particular approach to a world-wide
measurement of democracy (Section 4)?
2. INDICES OF MEASURING
DEMOCRACY AND THE
QUALITY OF DEMOCRACY:
FREEDOM HOUSE,
DEMOCRACY INDEX AND
THE DEMOCRACY RANKING
Three initiatives for democracy-indices will
be discussed in the following that measure
democracies in a global comparison: Freedom
House, Democracy Index, and Democracy
Ranking. These concepts and methods of mea-
suring democracy will be summarized. Since
these are quantifying measurement methods,
the results of democratic measurements can
be basically presented in form of rankings, in
which the evaluation of democracies and of
the quality of democracy can also be achieved
(at least implicitly). Because these initiatives
compare democracies worldwide, they can be
classified as global macro-models for measure-
ment of democracy. “Indicator-based” means
that they work with quantifiable (quantifying)
information for which, however, expert estima-
tions (peer reviews) often play an important
(prior) role:
1. FreedomHouse1: The central dimension
of democracy and democracy measure-
ment for Freedom House is freedom.
Freedom House publishes annually a Map
of Freedom with an individual country
documentation, which, however, always
refers to the previous year. For example,
the Map of Freedom 2011 thus focuses on
the year 2010 (Freedom House, 2011a,
2011b). Freedom is equivalently measured
with political rights and civil liberties in
which the political rights are divided into
three subcategories and the civil liberties
into four (see Freedom House, 2011c, pp.
31-32). Each of these subcategories is pre-
sented in specific questions, with selected-
expert-answers per country (and for a few
other territories). They give raw values for

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the questions in the form of points (raw
points), where more points imply a more
positive valuation. The raw points are then
aggregated, whereby the point spectrum for
the political rights ranges from 0 to 40 and
for the civil liberties from 0 to 60. After-
wards, for both areas the point spectrum is
transformed into a seven point scale (1-7),
with a reversed value scheme, with 1 as the
best value (most free) and 7 as the worst
(least free) (see ibid., p. 24). Both scales
aggregated equally together result then in
the freedom status with the valuation for
the following scalar ranges: 1.0 to 2.5 =
free; 3.0 to 5.0 = partly free; 5.5 to 7.00 =
not free (see Freedom House, 2011d). The
free countries are considered by Freedom
House to be liberal democracies. Since
1972, Freedom House has created this an-
nual evaluation of freedom and documented
it entirely until the present (see Freedom
House, 2011b). Furthermore, during the
last years, Freedom House has decided to
publish the raw points: each individual ag-
gregate for the political rights and the civil
liberties since 2002 (see Freedom House,
2011e), and further broken down for the
subcategories since 2006 (see Freedom
House, 2011f). In addition, Freedom House
(2011g) compares yearly, since 1980, free-
dom of the press worldwide (for further
reading, see Pickel and Pickel, 2006, pp.
209–221; Rosenberger and Seeber, 2008,
pp. 12–15);
2. Democracy Index2: The Democracy
Index is created by the British Economist
Intelligence Unit, which associates with
the Economist Group and the Economist
Newspaper. The Democracy Index refers
conceptually and directly to Freedom
House with its democratic measurements
and freedom evaluations, but criticizes
Freedom House for equating the concepts
freedom and democracy as too synony-
mously (see Economist Intelligence Unit,
2011, p. 29): Laza Kekic emphasizes that
freedom is an important component of
democracy, but nevertheless the political
rights and the civil liberties alone are not
sufficient (see Kekic, 2007, pp. 1-2). The
Democracy Index therefore distinguishes
among the following five categories which
can also be interpreted as dimensions of
democracy (see Economist Intelligence
Unit, 2011, pp. 1, 30): (1) electoral pro-
cess and pluralism, (2) functioning of
government, (3) political participation,
(4) political culture, (5) civil liberties. In
these described categories a total of 60
indicators are bundled and summarized.
The evaluation of the indicators is primar-
ily assessed by experts (representing a
peer review process); however, surveying
processes are also included, primarily by
referring to the World Values Survey. Each
indicator is ranked on a scale of 0 to 10
(see ibid, p. 31-33). The numerical rating
of an indicator reflects the total value of
the Democracy Index, which is also rated
from a maximal value range from 0 to 10,
in which “10” is the highest and “0” is the
lowest value for democracy. Depending
on the value spectrum of the total values,
the Democracy Index distinguishes among
four types of regimes (ibid., pp. 31-32): (1)
full democracies, scores from 10 to 8; (2)
flawed democracies, scores from 7.9 to 6;
(3) hybrid regimes, scores from 5.9 to 4;
(4) authoritarian regimes, scores below 4
(see also Kekic, 2007, p. 8);
3. Democracy Ranking3: The “Democ-
racy Ranking” is an annually performed
democratic study in the form of a “world-
ranking-list of democracies”. This world-
ranking-list is published by the “Vienna
Democracy Ranking Association” in Aus-
tria, and developed out of an originally
Austro-Hungarian scientific cooperation
(see Campbell and Sükösd, 2002). The
study of the Democracy Ranking explicitly
reflects the quality of democracy as the
distinguishing conceptual feature for a
global measurement of democracies. The
Democratic Ranking stands clearly in the
line of a “wider” democratic understanding
and applies the following conceptual for-

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mula for democracy and democratic quality
(see Campbell, 2008, p. 41; Campbell et
al., 2010, p. 5): Quality of Democracy =
(freedom & other characteristics of the
political systems) & (performance of the
non-political dimensions). The Democracy
Ranking distinguishes among six dimen-
sions and assigns empirical indicators
to these. The political dimension (the
political system) is compared to five non-
political dimensions: gender (economic
and socio-economic integration of women,
educational standards and life expectancy
of women), economy, knowledge, health,
and the environment (ecology).4 The em-
phasis on knowledge should also establish
the connection between knowledge-based
democracy and the quality of democracy
(see Carayannis and Campbell, 2009, pp.
207–208, 217–218, 224–227; 2010, pp.
58, 61-62). The two most important (me-
thodically strongest weighted) indicators
for the political system are the freedom
valuation by Freedom House: the values
for political rights and the civil liberties
are taken directly from there. The non-
political indicators represent real empiri-
cal performance measures (e.g., GDP per
capita, participation rates in the educational
system, life expectancy, or low CO2 emis-
sions). Primarily the World Development
Indicators of the World Bank are used
here as the data source for the applied
performance indicators in the Democracy
Ranking, in which the World Bank acquires
and bundles these data often from other
organizations (see, for example, World
Bank, 2008, 2009, 2010). With respect to
“output”, a political left-right-neutrality
of the democracy ranking model should
be achieved (see Campbell, 2008, pp.
30–32; Campbell & Sükösd, 2002, pp.
4–5). For the Democracy Ranking, it is not
significant how left or right (conservative)
the democracies are politically imprinted
(see for example Campbell, 2007). Rather
the freedom and other characteristics of
politics as well as the performance of the
non-political dimensions are significant.
Higher quality of democracy can thus be
realized just as well from stronger left as
well as from conservative political systems.
This focus of output or achievement of
the Democracy Ranking underscores the
“wider” democracy assessment and has as a
result the tendency that socio-economically
developed countries show a higher demo-
cratic quality ranking. Socio-economic
development can actually lead to quality of
“life worlds” (“Lebenswelten”) of humans
and thus to quality of democracy. Avail-
able “knowledge” as well as developed or
mature socio-economic societal structures,
which give many people access to educa-
tion, basically allow more people to be
active (well-informed) voters or also to
enter politics (as political “newcomers”)
(see Jankowitsch, 2005). Furthermore, it
should also be discussed in the Democracy
Ranking, what are or should be “fair”
comparative countries or meaningful
“benchmark” countries in democracies.
Socio-economically developed countries
can always occupy higher ranking ranges.
The actual ranking procedure applies an
aggregation process. All indicators are
transformed into a value range between 1
(minimum) and 100 (maximum), where
minimum and maximum refers to the lows
and highs of the observed empirical indica-
tors (normally also covering several years),
and then average values are calculated
per country for each dimension and are
displayed extra. These average values over
all dimensions will then be aggregated for
the total ranking, in which the following
weighting is used: politics 50%, all other
non-political dimensions at 10% each. The
first pilot ranking was performed for the
double years 1998 and 1999 (see Campbell
& Sükösd, 2003). The actual Democracy
Ranking 2010 covers the years 2005 to
2006 and 2008 to 2009, and therefore
observes the “real” level differences of
democratic quality over a many-year period
(see Campbell et al., 2010). Only those

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countries are included in the Democracy
Ranking that are classified by Freedom
House as free or at least “partly” (partially)
free and furthermore have a population of
at least a million inhabitants.5 However,
as an exception to this rule, the Vienna
Democracy Ranking Association calculates
sometimes so-called “virtual scores”: in
context of the Democracy Ranking 2010
for the Russian Federation (Russia) and
China, although these states are considered
as “not free” by Freedom House. In this
way it should be methodically indicated
what the results of the model of Democracy
Ranking would be for Russia and China,
would they represent standard democra-
cies. Furthermore, the countries Puerto
Rico, Taiwan and Hong Kong as well as
the countries with too many missing indica-
tor values (called “missings”), are or were
excluded from the Democracy Ranking
2010.6 Based on these ranking results, a
Democracy Improvement Ranking is also
created and published, which primarily
measures the “relative” ranking changes
as well as score gains or decreases over
time. 7 The Democracy-Ranking-Initiative
plans to annually calculate a new ranking
of quality of democracy in a world-wide
approach and global comparison, and
thus to retroactively always use the most
current data (see Campbell, 2008, 30–41;
Campbell & Sükösd, 2002; Campbell &
Barth, 2009). Furthermore, it is plausible to
assert that the underlying model of quality
of democracy of the Democracy Ranking
actually advocates and follows ideas of
sustainable development.
In conclusion, it can be implicitly argued
for Freedom House: the higher the freedom
evaluation of a country, the greater the chances
are or the more there is an expectation of a
tendency for an advanced quality of democ-
racy. This should qualify at least as a working
proposition or working hypothesis. Statements
of Rosenberger and Seeber about Freedom
House can be interpreted in this way, again
applied to the freedom evaluation of countries
by Freedom House (see Rosenberger & Seeber,
2008, p. 14). The Democracy Index criticizes
Freedom House for being too concentrated on
freedom evaluations. In addition the question
is being raised, whether the freedom evaluation
by Freedom House is too focused on the priori-
ties of the U.S. American foreign policy.8 The
Democracy Index follows a wider democracy
understanding, but at the same time it could be
argued that the fundamental theoretical or con-
ceptual dimensions are less clearly defined. Also
it is not clearly established to which calendar
years, for example, the Democracy Index 2006
(Kekic, 2007) or the Democracy Index 2010
(Economist Intelligence Unit 2011) are related.
Furthermore, the web display of the Democracy
Index is less transparent (when compared with
Freedom House), relative to which experts
by the Democracy Index were consulted for
their estimates. It must be underscored for the
Democracy Ranking that the socio-economic
ranking clearly influences the ranking of the
quality of democracy. If the three initiatives
discussed here of democracy measurement are
ordered according to how “narrow” or “wide”
the basic understanding of democracy is, then
the following ordering results from “narrow”
to “wide”: Freedom House, Democracy Index,
and Democracy Ranking (see generally about
indices of democracy: Munck & Verkuilen,
2002; Müller & Pickel, 2007).
3. THE DEMOCRACY
RANKING AND SCORES OF
THE DEMOCRACY RANKING
2010 (SCORES RE-SCALED
TO SCALES OF 0-100)
The Democracy Ranking 20109 calculates
average scores for all democracies for the
double years 2005-2006 and 2008-2009, and
re-arranges gains or losses in scores in the
Democracy Improvement Ranking 201010. As
democracies all those countries are typologized
that were classified by Freedom House as “free”
or at least as “partly free” in the three-year period

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of 2007-2009. In addition, only those countries
are being considered with a population of at least
one million. The Democracy Ranking 2010 also
calculates “virtual scores” for Russia and China,
even though these countries were not regarded
to be free or to be partly free by Freedom House.
This should take the geopolitical importance of
Russia and China into account. All together,
the Democracy Ranking 2010 is based on 43
indicators.11 All democracies (countries) are
re-scored per indicator and over the period of
2005-2006 and 2008-2009 to a value spectrum
from 1 to 100, where 1 represents the lowest
numerical value and 100 the highest value (of
those countries that are being addressed by
the Democracy Ranking). The indicators are
assigned to one political dimension and five
non-political dimensions, with the following
dimensional weight: politics: 50%; gender:
10%; economy: 10%; knowledge: 10%; health:
10%; and the environment: 10% (Campbell,
2008, p. 34).
Combined and aggregated together, those
dimensions then generate the overall scoring for
the Democracy Ranking, and the Democracy
Ranking 2010 more specifically. In Tables 1-3,
these overall scores are being presented for all
covered democracies (countries) for the years
2005-2006 and 2008-2009. The Democracy
Ranking refers to a total of one-hundred de-
mocracies (countries). In Tables 1-3, all scores
were re-scored to a value spectrum of 0-100,
with 0 being the lowest, and 100 the highest
value for the whole year period of 2005-2006
and 2008-2009. Tables 1-3 rank the countries on
the basis of their overall scores for 2008-2009.
We refer here to the Democracy Ranking as a
test case or bench mark, to demonstrate, what
the practical implications and consequences
of the underlying model of the Democracy
Ranking (Campbell, 2008, pp. 30-41)12 are for
the concrete ranking of democracies, which
focuses conceptually (and theoretically) on
the quality of democracy, and when empirical
indicators are being used as an input for the
model. The Democracy Ranking 2010 can and
should be understood and should be interpreted
as a proposition for a ranking of democracies
in reference to their quality of democracy,
and this in a world-wide approach of global
comparison. For a further discussion, results
of the Democracy Ranking 2010 should also
be compared with and evaluated against the
results of the Democracy Ranking 2011 (see
Campbell et al., 2012)13 and the Democracy
Ranking 201214.
4. CONCLUSION: THE NEW
FINDINGS OF THE
DEMOCRACY RANKING 2010
The Democracy Ranking displays what happens
when the freedom ratings of Freedom House
are combined with the Human Development
Index (HDI) of the United Nations Develop-
ment Program (see, for example, UNDP, 2010),
to understand democracy and the quality of
democracy more comprehensively. Interna-
tional organizations often avoid making direct
statements about democracy because they are
afraid to get involved in conflicts with their
member states. This is also an “innovation trap”
for international organizations. Therefore, the
civil society and independent researchers have
an important and innovative task to undergo,
and may also benefit from this as a competitive
advantage. The Democracy Ranking represents
a civil-society-based international initiative.
Freedom is often associated with conserva-
tive, whereas equality with more left-leaning
ideologies (see Harding et al., 1986, p. 87). The
Democracy Ranking intentionally deals with
the performance profile of various non-political
dimensions (economy, gender, knowledge,
health, and environment). For this reason,
subjective expert assessments about freedom
and equality should be additionally objecti-
fied. The Democracy Ranking attempts to be
more neutral, more evenly balanced and fairer
with regard to left and right ideologies. Here,
“sustainable development” plays a special and
key role in this scenario.
Any model that calculates the quality of
democracy can be criticized. By using other
indices or weights, would that change the de-

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Table 1. Democracy Ranking 2010: Countries’ ranked by score in 2008-09 (scores rescaled to
0-100)

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Table 2. Democracy Ranking 2010 (cont.)

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mocracy ranking? For whatever model used:
an important final argument is that models of
democracy measurement provide an important
meaning to the topic of democracy and qual-
ity of democracy in public and media-based
discourses15, enhancing awareness in the field.
The talk about democracy and the meaning of
democratic quality have increased.
Based on the ranking results and scores
of the Democracy Ranking 2010 (covering
100 countries), the following country-specific
assessment can be provided and can be set up
for discussion. Here we engage in the formu-
lation and development of propositions that
focus on evaluating democracy and the quality
of democracy:
1. RussiaandChina: Even though the Free-
dom House classifies Russia and China
as “not free”, both countries have been
admitted to the Democracy Ranking 2010,
to demonstrate where the two states (coun-
tries) would be placed after the application
of a legitimate formula of democracy mea-
surement. These “virtual scores” certify
both countries a low placement: position
87 for Russia and position 97 for China
(ahead of Nigeria and behind Zambia). Both
countries score partially better in economi-
cal development and knowledge, however
worse in health and almost catastrophic in
the political dimension. At the moment,
Russia and China cannot be termed as
“normal” democracies. With regard to the
many-facetted admiration of China’s eco-
nomic growth in western media, it has to be
kept in mind that the political structures of
this rising economic super giant still tend
to be authoritarian. What consequences
would that have on the international system
and for global democracy in the future? A
continuous advance in democratization in
both the countries would push and create
an important positive impact on political
world affairs. An advance in democracy
in Russia (when compared with China) is
Table 3. Democracy Ranking 2010 (cont.)

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perhaps more realistic in the short term. But
there may also be surprises in this regard;
2. The Top 10 (Top 15) Countries of the
DemocracyRanking2010: The Nordic
countries (Norway, Sweden, Finland, Den-
mark) and Switzerland are ranked as the
top 5 countries; New Zealand, Netherlands,
Ireland, Germany and the United Kingdom
also score very high. The continuous global
top positioning of the Nordic countries is
impressive; also because they manage to
reproduce a high scoring in the different
dimensions in a stable way, with a top
scoring in gender equality and knowledge.
For this reason, it can be stated: the Nordic
countries represent the highest empirical
implementation of quality of democracy
(democratic quality) in the beginning of
the twenty-first century. Also: the Nordic
countries define (in a positive aspect) a
global benchmark for empirically possible
democratic quality. Out of the Top 10 coun-
tries, seven belong to the European Union.
Altogether, the prominent representation
of European democracies is noticeable
in the top positions. This underlines that
the European integration process should
be understood more clearly as a “democ-
racy project” in the global context. The
“democracy quality” of European democ-
racies will influence the sustainability of
European integration and of the EU (and
its supranational institutions) as a whole.
Likewise, Germany scored very high in the
quality of democracy. Germany managed
to hold and expand its top position and
belongs thereby to the stable democracies
with a higher quality of democracy when
compared globally. Germany thereby
shows an interesting case study of how a
democracy implements and successfully
continues to develop qualitatively. The
classical English-speaking countries find
themselves under the Top 15. In the last
few years, the United States of America
improved its rank from position 16 to 15.
For a continuative and an academically-
based discussion, it would be interesting
to compare more systematically the quality
of democracy of the United States with the
democratic quality of the “complete area”
of EU15 or EU27;
3. Hungary,BulgariaandItaly: Hungary is
the big “relative loser” as a European de-
mocracy. Hungry sank to the rank 32 from
rank 26. Bulgaria is the only democracy
in Europe, which did not lose only in the
relative ranking, but also lost in absolute
points. Bulgaria, as well as Italy, faced
losses in the political dimension of “politi-
cal rights”, “civil liberties” and freedom
of press. This shows with all clarity that a
certain degree of democracy and quality
of democracy cannot be misunderstood as
“fixed”. Democracy is always in motion;
all economies and political systems have
to deal with it continuously, to maintain
the degree of democracy, and to be able
to constantly improve it;
4. Poland: Within the European Union (EU),
Poland achieved the greatest improvement
in the quality of democracy. Poland man-
aged to stabilize and to continuously score
dynamically in all the dimensions. Apart
from a rapid economical development,
the democratic quality saw a notable im-
provement. The young EU member state
hereby shows impressively that the quality
of democracy is surely no privilege of the
established “old” democracies in Western
Europe;
5. Serbia: In recent years, Serbia is that
democracy which realized the second
greatest advance in a world-wide com-
parison. Serbia lies in the relative advance
of Europe with a noticeable lead at first
position. Serbia has improved itself in all
dimensions. If Serbia manages to keep
the tempo upright, then it will be possibly
granted a membership to the EU perhaps
even earlier. At least it would be easier to
argue in favor of an earlier access to EU
membership;
6. SouthKorea,Israel,Singapore,andKu-
wait: The Democracy Ranking 2010 clari-
fies that in many cases emerging economies

12 International Journal of Social Ecology and Sustainable Development, 4(1), 1-16, January-March 2013
Copyright © 2013, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
(at least in particular dimensions) score
higher than many “traditional western”
democracies. Democracy and quality of
democracy (democratic quality) is hereby
a more global phenomenon, and is no more
only a privilege of the old industrial nations.
The world of democracies is multiplying,
is becoming increasingly pluralistic. South
Korea and Israel score very high in the
dimension of knowledge (for instance,
noticeably higher than Austria), Kuwait and
Singapore rank very high in the economic
dimension. Whereas Kuwait scored lower
in the other dimensions, Singapore’s devel-
opment has demonstrated more effectively
sustainability, because Singapore scored
better in a broader spectrum of dimensions;
7. In di a and Bangl ad esh: Regarding
democratic quality, India and Bangladesh
position themselves worldwide in the
bottom third, in which India (rank 69 for
2008-2009) scored higher than Bangladesh
(rank 78 for 2008-2009). India character-
izes itself most notably thereby by scor-
ing higher in the political and economic
dimensions than in gender equality, health
and knowledge. A particular challenge
for India’s quality of democracy is, if the
political system can manage economical
success in reproducible performance in
other domains, so that bigger masses and
numbers of the population can participate
in the economical development and can
profit from economic success. That will be
fundamental and decisive for the sustain-
ability of India’s democracy. In the case
of Bangladesh, the disparity between the
different dimensions of political, economic
and social development is not so great,
even though the economic progress is in
Bangladesh less dynamic. Conversely, the
improvement in quality of democracy in
Bangladesh is higher than in India in recent
years.
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ENDNOTES
1 Visit Freedom House on the web at: http://
www.freedomhouse.org
2 The general website of the Democracy Index is
at: http://www.eiu.com/Default.aspx, https://
www.eiu.com/public/topical_report.aspx?ca
mpaignid=DemocracyIndex2011 and http://
www.eiu.com/index.asp?rf=0
3 The Democracy Ranking can be accessed on
the web at: http://www.democracyranking.
org/en/
4 In consequence of this, the quality-of-de-
mocracy model of the Democracy Ranking
appears also to be compatible with the models
of knowledge production and innovation
of the “Quadruple Helix” and “Quintuple
Helix” innovation systems (Carayannis and
Campbell, 2012; Campbell and Carayannis,
2013).
5 Two factors play into not considering micro-
states for the Democracy Ranking: first, the
empirical indicator base for micro-states is
often troublesome. Second, micro-states are
often not representative in socio-economic
terms. For example, functioning as a “tax
haven” may define a crucial source of revenues
for micro-states.
6 See the Democracy Ranking 2010 of the
Vienna Democracy Ranking Association
(2010a): http://www.democracyranking.org/
en/archive.htm#worldmap2010
7 See also the Improvement Ranking 2010 of
the Vienna Democracy Ranking Association
(2010b): http://www.democracyranking.org/
en/archive.htm#improvement2010
8 Manfred G. Schmidt comments on Freedom
House that “nicht alle Informationen über
die Gewichtung der Beobachtungsergebnisse
eindeutig und in allen Details nachvollziehbar”
are (Schmidt, 2006, p. 413). In addition, empir-
ical scores of American-produced indicators
perhaps display “eine Schieflage zugunsten
des US-amerikanischen Regierungssystems”
(ibid., p. 407).
9 Access on the web the Democracy Ranking
2010 at: http://www.democracyranking.org/
en/archive.htm#worldmap2010
10 See the Democracy Improvement Ranking
2010 under: http://www.democracyranking.
org/en/archive.htm#improvement2010
11 The complete list of indicators is being
documented: http://www.democracyranking.
org/downloads/democracy_ranking_2010-
list%20of%20indicators.xls
12 See on the web also: http://www.democra-
cyranking.org/downloads/basic_concept_de-
mocracy_ranking_2008_A4.pdf
13 See: http://www.democracyranking.org/en/
archive.htm#worldmap2011
14 See: http://www.democracyranking.org/en/
ranking.htm
15 See also the precise definition for the Qua-
druple Helix innovation system in Carayannis
and Campbell (2012, p. 14).
David F. J. Campbell is a Research Fellow at the Institute of Science Communication and Higher
Education Research (WIHO), Faculty for Interdisciplinary Studies (iff), Alpen-Adria-University
of Klagenfurt; Lecturer in Political Science at the University of Vienna; and Quality Enhance-
ment Manager and Quality Researcher at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. Campbell
lead-authored Epistemic Governance in Higher Education: Quality Enhancement of Universities
for Development (Springer, 2013) and Democracy Ranking (Edition 2012): The Quality of De-
mocracy in the World (Books on Demand, 2012); co-authored Mode 3 Knowledge Production in
Quadruple Helix Innovation Systems: 21st-Century Democracy, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship
for Development (Springer, 2012); co-edited Encyclopedia of Creativity, Invention, Innovation
and Entrepreneurship (Springer, 2013), Knowledge Creation, Diffusion, and Use in Innovation
Networks and Knowledge Clusters (Praeger, 2006) and Demokratiequalität in Österreich: Zustand
und Entwicklungsperspektiven (Leske + Budrich, 2002) (“Democracy Quality in Austria”). His
articles on knowledge, innovation, knowledge economy and democracy, knowledge democracy
and quality of democracy have been published in several international journals. David Campbell
is Academic Director of the global Democracy Ranking of the quality of democracy.

16 International Journal of Social Ecology and Sustainable Development, 4(1), 1-16, January-March 2013
Copyright © 2013, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.
Elias G. Carayannis is Full Professor of Science, Technology, Innovation and Entrepreneurship,
as well as co-Founder and co-Director of the Global and Entrepreneurial Finance Research
Institute (GEFRI) and Director of Research on Science, Technology, Innovation and Entrepre-
neurship, European Union Research Center, (EURC) at the School of Business of the George
Washington University in Washington, DC. Dr. Carayannis’ teaching and research activities
focus on the areas of strategic Government- University-Industry R&D partnerships, technology
road-mapping, technology transfer and commercialization, international science and technology
policy, technological entrepreneurship and regional economic development. Dr. Carayannis has
several publications in both academic and practitioner journals, including IEEE Transactions in
Engineering Management, Research Policy, Journal of R&D Management, Journal of Engineering
and Technology Management, International Journal of Technology Management, Technovation,
Journal of Technology Transfer, Engineering Management Journal, Journal of Growth and Change,
Review of Regional Studies, International Journal of Global Energy Issues, International Journal
of Environment and Pollution, Le Progres Technique, and Focus on Change Management. He
has also published sixteen books to date on science, technology, innovation and entrepreneur-
ship with CRC Press, Praeger/Greenwood, Palgrave/MacMillan and Edward Elgar, and has
several more projects under contract. He is Editor-in-Chief of the Edward Elgar Book Series on
Science, Technology, Innovation and Entrepreneurship; the Springer Book Series on Innovation,
Technology, and Knowledge Management; the Springer Journal of the Knowledge Economy;
the Springer Journal of Innovation and Entrepreneurship; and the IGI International Journal of
Social Ecology and Sustainable Development; and Associate Editor of the International Journal
of Innovation and Regional Development.
Thorsten D. Barth is a political scientist (graduated with a dissertation (Dr. phil.) from the
University of Vienna, Austria), a graphic designer and an academic entrepreneur in Austria.
His last publication in IJSESD was “The Idea of a Green New Deal in a Quintuple Helix Model
of Knowledge, Know-how and Innovation” in the International Journal of Social Ecology and
Sustainable Development (January-March 2011, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 1-14).
George S. Campbell is a retired computer specialist who was manager of systems engineering at
IBM Austria and of education at IBM ROECE (responsible for the Eastern European countries),
both located in Vienna, Austria. His current interests are languages and genealogy.