Online Data Sources

 

  • Political
    • Governance
    • Stability
    • Corruption
    • Freedom and human rights
  • Social
    • United Nations
    • Population
    • Health
    • Ethnic groups
    • Religion
    • Quality of life
    • Socio-economic
  • Economic
    • General
    • Income
    • Resources – natural, food, water, sanitation
    • Economic freedom
    • Development
    • Global investment
  • Security
    • Armed conflict
    • Military balance
    • Conflict data
    • Disaster security

See also: Key to source classifications

 

Political (^)

All of the sources in this section could be listed under the “governance” sub-section, but “stability,” “corruption,” and “freedom and human rights” have been set aside as separate sub-sections to improve accessibility.

Governance

Stability

Concerning the stability and continuity of states from a political, economic, and social (not military) perspective.   While armed conflict is a major factor in the rise and fall of states, these sources emphasize other aspects of state continuity.  For a more military security-based perspective, see the Security section.  See also the World Bank’s World Governance Indicators, listed above, for its “stability” indicator.

Corruption

Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) is the most commonly cited measurement of corruption today.  It is regularly cited by governments and academics alike.  The other two measures (one from TI, the other from a competitor) are provided as the best available alternatives.  Also see the World Bank’s “control of corruption” indicator, found in the world governance indicators dataset, listed above.

Freedom and human rights

Sources in this section deal with political and press (as opposed to economic) freedom.  Although there are numerous social, economic, and military aspects to the protection of human rights, all sources that primarily treat the question of human rights have been included here.

 

Social (^)

United Nations

The following are the UN’s official sources of social statistics.  These are among the most reliable and comprehensive sources for measures of education, health, housing, etc.

Population

Health

Ethnic groups

The Minorities at Risk project is a major dataset of information on minority ethnic groups worldwide.

Religion

The following are quantitative measures of the state of global religion.

Quality of life

Research on measuring the quality of life across countries has yet to develop any standard measures or methods.  The following is one such project, which combines socio-economic indicators to put a number on the well-being of a nation’s people.

Islamic world

The following source is specific to the Islamic world, providing socio-economic data for each member of the OIC.

 

Economic (^)

Financial

The IMF is the most comprehensive, up-to-date source of global financial information.

Income

Resources – natural, food, water, sanitation

The following factors impact social conditions as much as they do economic conditions.  Because resources are measured in economic terms, and the provision of emergency supplements to these resources is a mostly economic question, these sources are found in the “economic” section.

Economic freedom

While the political section lists indicators of political freedom, so does this section list indicators of economic freedom, generally defined as the ease of doing business, the presence of legal protections and financial provisions, and the relative limitation of regulation in a given country.

Development

The following indicators are not limited to economic factors.  Development is, rather, a comprehensive measure of economic, social, and political factors.  This “Development” section has been included in the “Economic” section because development is most often associated with economic phenomena such as globalization and foreign investment.

Global economics

This section includes measures of globalization, global investment, and global competitiveness.

 

Security (^)

This section includes statistics on military and other violence, standardized conflict data, and records of natural and technological disasters.

Armed conflict

Military balance

Conflict data

These two datasets, especially COW, are the standard sources for modern conflict data.  They are both comprehensive, reliable, and often cited by social scientists.

Disaster security

 

Key (Back to Top ^)

{ind} Indicators: These sources survey various statistical categories at a national level, allowing comparison between countries and often single-country comparison over time.  The data shown are generally simplified or composite scores, allowing rankings.

{sta} Statistical dataset: Provides numbers, across time and/or between countries, to quantify various measures of a country’s status.  Many sources could be considered either indicators {ind} or statistical datasets {sta}, but sources considered statistical datasets are generally more complex.

{evt} Event-driven dataset: Each record in these databases represents a single event and provides information on that occurrence.

{doc} Document collection: Each entry in this database is a written document.  Records cannot be directly compared or aggregated.

 

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Contact: nlotito(at)haverford.edu, kdrooyan(at)haverford.edu

Last updated: August 1, 2009.