Global Peace Index 2025
visionofhumanity.org
visionofhumanity.org
Whenever countries are ranked against each other, discussions inevitably focus on the relative ranks and ignore the underlying causes of any drop in scores.
When a country moves up in rank mostly because some other countries moved down, it feels odd to the people there who wonder why they ranked higher without any improvements on the ground. Nationalist governments tend to claim the higher rank is because of their policies, knowing that their people most likely won't study the changes in score components of previous years.
That's why unsafe but underdeveloped nations rank higher than some countries that are often considered domestically safe.
Both Russia and the US have nukes but have been involved in fairly large scale wars during the last 20 years.
Hypothetically, I would rather live in a country like the US. I'm sure the machinery of US is good enough to protect its inland citizens when they wage wars on less fortunate ones for whatever reason.
Russia is a different matter. I get it.
At least that would explain how "Palestine" ranks as (slightly) more peaceful than Israel even though it's probably one of the most "unsafe" places on the planet right now.
Also Russia has the highest score but has neither the world's most powerful military nor would it be the least safe country to live in. But it likely is the country with the largest army that is currently engaged in open, offensive warfare.
It's a useful thing to measure for sure, but if that's what's measured, shouldn't there be more focus on the alliances and power relations between the countries? E.g. all the countries are listed individually here, but some are members of NATO, some of BRICS or SCO, some have bilateral military agreements, etc.
How would this deal with "proxy conflicts" and non-state actors?
If this had been published a few years before, would the breakaway Donbass republics have counted as countries? (If yes, they might even have counted as relatively "peaceful" as there was no reason for them to attack anything - their existence was the attack)
Would Hezbollah be counted towards Lebanon, towards Iran, towards Palestine or not counted at all?
Erdős numbers for instance, a higher number indicates less distance to Erdős.
What exactly is this list supposed to represent?
I'm very happy that Slovenia is 9th safest. And wondering wtf I'm doing in USA which is rapidly falling to the bottom.
Looking at the indices, while Norway is generally low on all the indicators, it’s maxed out on weapons exports and weapons imports. Not sure why that is? Because NATO traffics through there a bunch?
Meanwhile, next door Sweden ranks lower in these categories, even though Saab makes air fighters and the like. Weird numbers indeed.
"Positive Peace is defined as the attitudes, institutions and structures that create and sustain peaceful societies. The Positive Peace Index measures the level of societal resilience of a nation or region according."
And the United States scores very high. Losing a bit of credibility there.
> Those who ‘abjure’ violence can do so only because others are committing violence on their behalf
In addition the military has not taken over, but currently seems to be honoring the demand of the protestors for new leadership and addressing the widespread corruption in the nation.
It’s too early to call, to be sure. But I’m hopeful that there can be a peaceful transition from here towards something better for Nepal.
The recent protests would have not been covered in this edition.
The thing started with the police _killing_ more than 10 children. And after that the crowd went after places like police stations, some palaces and the parliament. Most politicians fled, but the ones that were caught up were mostly bitten up, not killed.
As someone from Eastern Europe, who lived through the fall of the Soviet Union, it all seemed remarkably chill and peaceful - people were really after justice, not vengeance.
Prisons were mostly filled by political prisoners, though some bad apples took advantage to escape as well.
Being just a few kilometres away from the epicentre of things, it all felt very chill, people on the streets were very happy, police were ok, military was smiling and chatty - they were giving people water and trying to “look helpful”
Just the media wants to portray chaos cause that’s what’s driving the clicks, but the situation on the ground was quite ok.
The people did a quick *discord* vote, chose an interim president - who is someone everyone in the country agrees is one of the few incorruptible and honest people, and they will apparently have a proper election at some point when things settle down.
As “revolution” goes this seems like the most sane one I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen a few …
The US also has much more weapons exports, and external military involvement.
People deciding where to travel are largely thinking about "violent crime" levels moreso than "how many fighter jets does this country sell"
This report tries to also take into account things like "Military size, expenditure, and weapon exports", which surely indicates a non-peaceful nation, even if on the ground citizens can live peacefully.
If the definition of "peace" includes nation-level involvement in conflict, then I think it's very fair to argue that the US isn't a peaceful country. Papua New Guinea is not providing significant military support to multiple wars at once. The US certainly is.
and yet they are more peaceful than the USA.
The border dispute has been going on for decades though, but just recently escalated to deaths.
The russia had started over a dozen wars and committed multiple genocides, one of which is globally recognized, all in just the last hundred years. Ukraine had only been defending in at least the last three centuries.
This rating is bs, because the methodology doesn't make sense.
But to be fair, if it makes people to stop and look why they have different preconceived ideas, I think it's a positive. For example I didn't know that Norway is so militaristic.
"Don't be snarky."
The US has problems. I myself was the victim of a violent robbery 15 years ago. But the idea that it’s less peaceful than South Africa, Lesotho, Sierra Leone, and only marginally more peaceful than Haiti? Come on…
United States is nearly always in conflict to the point that it is difficult to find a year where USA is not involved in a conflict.