This past May, Foreign Policy magazine and the Fund for Peace released their second annual “Failed States Rankings.” The ‘top’ of the list should not be surprising to anyone: Sudan, Congo, Ivory Coast, Iraq (There’s $315 billion well spent), with Zimbabwe rounding out a fab five of failure.
The rankings are based on a number of criteria including the number of displaced persons, uneven development, social fractures, economic performance, and human rights. Corruption indirectly plays a role as well. On a separate graph, the study shows how the ‘health’ of a state tracks closely with its rankings in terms of transparency and corruption.
Perhaps most surprising was the performance of China. Now, I am no starry-eyed lover of the Beijing government, but I was surprised to see the PRC at number 54, wedged below Moldova, Nicaragua and Georgia (presumably the one with Tbilisi as its capital, not Atlanta) and just ahead of Bolivia.
China’s performance was unexpected for the authors of the study as well.
“More surprising is China’s slide in the index. With its economy booming, few analysts would classify China as a vulnerable state, and yet its index score dropped 10 points from last year. Why? China