Ranking state weakness in the developing world

A new report by the Brookings Institution ranks and evaluates 141 developing nations based on their relative performance in four critical areas: economic, political, security and social welfare.

The methodology includes using 20 sub-indicators to give a snapshot in time of a country’s relative performance when compared to the other countries on the index. Probably not surprisingly, the report finds that there is a very strong correlation between poverty and overall weakness of a state.