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| Simon Anholt |
By Simon Anholt
Countries can no longer be judged purely on the progress or prosperity of their own citizens, their society or their economy: they must also be judged on the impact they have on the rest of humanity and the rest of the planet. That's why I created the "Good Country Index": the first survey that, instead of measuring the economic or social performance of individual countries, measures what each country contributes to the common good of humanity and to the planet.
The Republic of Korea has ranked 29th out of 163 countries in the latest edition of the index, published today. In the index, the global impact of each country is measured across seven categories, with five individual indicators in each (the full data for all editions of the index is available at www.good.country).
A good country is one that successfully contributes to the good of humanity. Of course, it must serve the interests of its own people, but never at the expense of other populations or our shared resources: this is the new law of human survival, and it's a balance which is far more easily maintained than many people imagine. Working together makes for better policy than working alone.
Launched in 2014, the aim of the Good Country Index is to find ways of encouraging countries to collaborate and co-operate a lot more, and compete a bit less. It also aims to trigger a global discussion on how countries can balance their duty to their own populations with their shared responsibility for the wider world.
The chart below shows South Korea's overall and category rankings for the latest edition of the Good Country Index (version 1.2) and the previous edition (1.1) which was released in 2016:
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Korea's lowest category ranking in the previous edition was a 92nd place for its contributions to international peace and security. NATO member states tended to have lower rankings in this category during the first and second editions of the Good Country Index, as a result of their participation in the ISAF mission in Afghanistan between 2010 and 2011; several, including Korea, are also weapons exporters, which also contributes to a lower rank in this category (note that these figures are divided by GDP to provide a more level playing field for all countries in the index).
The scores are now improving as they reflect the continued drawdown of combat troops in the area: the latest edition of the Good Country Index is based mainly on data from 2014, so any changes in a country's behaviour during the past three years have yet to be reflected in its GCI rankings. This is because most of the U.N. and other datasets that are used to calculate the Good Country Index, given the scale of the fieldwork involved, take several years to compile, analyse and publish.
Korea also has a particularly low ranking in the planet and climate category, which has dropped since the last edition of the index from 83rd to 98th place. This should be a cause for concern.
On the whole, however, Korea can be proud to rank within the top 30 in the Good Country Index, a result that suggests the country does more good than harm to the rest of the world outside its borders. There's plenty of room for improvement, of course.
This issue is critical: most of the problems humanity faces today are rapidly and dangerously multiplying because of uncontrolled globalisation. Governments must understand that they're not just responsible for their own voters and taxpayers, but for every living thing on the planet. They must collaborate and cooperate more, not less; countries aren't islands unconnected to the rest of the world. Every country on earth, whether its leaders or populations like it or not, is part of one system. If the system fails, we all fail.
Simon Anholt is the founder of the Good Country, a global movement aimed at helping countries work together to tackle global challenges like climate change, migration and terrorism.
He publishes the Good Country Index, a survey that ranks countries on their contribution to humanity and the planet, and in 2016 launched the Global Vote, which enables anybody in the world to vote in the elections of other countries. So far, more than a half a million people from 130 countries have participated in the Global Vote in the elections and referendums of 18 nations.
