According to the latest edition of The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index, released by The Economist on Tuesday, Turkey was ranked 110th among 167 countries, dropping 10 places over last year.
The index scored 167 countries from 0 to 10. Turkey’s score, which was above 5 until 2017 and fell to 4.88 in 2017, stood at 4.37 in 2018, falling under the category of “hybrid regime,” the second lowest after “authoritarian regime,” putting Turkey in a similar position to countries such as Ukraine, Zambia, Mali, Tanzania, Madagascar, Honduras and Bolivia.
Turkey’s score showed the second sharpest decline compared to last year after Italy, which fell from 21st to 33rd place, and the report underlined that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan swept aside most constraints on his power and subverted democratic institutions.
The index’s ranking was based on 60 indicators across five broad categories: electoral process and pluralism, the functioning of government, political participation, democratic political culture and civil liberties.
Although the index was stricter than most similar indices as it concluded that only 4.5 percent of the world’s people live in a “full democracy,” the overall global score remained stable in 2018 for the first time in three years. Just 42 countries experienced a decline, compared with 89 in 2017, while 48 countries improved.
The report warned, however, that this might be a pause rather than the end of democracy’s retreat.