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World Rankings and Data Sources to Visualize the Recoupling Dashboard

The Recoupling Dashboard shows that solidarity and agency develop differently over time and across countries compared to indexes of GDP per capita and environmental sustainability.

In its first publication, the evaluation for the Recoupling Dashboard includes data for 35 countries for the years from 2007-2018 to map and compare the developments of each dimension per country over a decade. On this page we show the scores for each country in 2018 in a world ranking per dimension (further rankings can be found in the appendix of the publication).

The data used for the Recoupling Dashboard comes from external, international sources such as the OECD, the World Bank, data projects (e.g.). The data used to calculate the two new indexes, Agency Index and Solidarity Index, is exclusively provided. The data sources are described below in detail.

The findings of the Recoupling Dashboard can be used to stimulate debate on the measurement of wellbeing and the implications for governments and businesses. On the country-level, it becomes clear that countries with a high GDP are not necessarily ones that show high solidarity or agency. The table shows which ranking position the 35 countries analyzed in the Recoupling Dashboard achieve in each of the four indexes in a global comparison in 2018, limited to the countries presented in the Recoupling Dashboard:

CountryGDP per capita 1Agency Index 2Social Solidarity Index 3Environmental Performance Index 4
Rankingconst. US 2010CountryScoreRankingScoreRankingScore
Luxembourg1 $     107.24340,88180,591983,10
Norway2 $       92.12150,8630,85293,10
Switzerland3 $       78.81610,9480,75195,50
Ireland4 $       76.881120,8270,762182,70
Denmark5 $       62.931100,8320,851684,00
Sweden6 $       57.232110,82100,73293,10
Australia7 $       56.919150,8150,832679,80
Netherlands8 $       55.02380,8490,742978,70
United States9 $       54.542200,78140,672381,00
Iceland10 $       52.10390,8340,84887,60
Canada11 $       51.38230,89110,71986,60
Austria12 $       50.250160,80150,66589,40
Japan13 $       48.920130,81240,431384,50
Finland14 $       48.44560,8460,78491,40
Germany15 $       47.50220,91120,671086,30
Belgium16 $       46.683180,80170,603078,40
France17 $       43.664220,75230,45787,80
United Kingdom18 $       42.986140,81130,671086,30
New Zealand19 $       38.00070,8410,86688,90
Italy20 $       35.392260,64220,491484,20
Israel21 $       34.789190,80190,562879,60
Spain22 $       33.146250,64160,631983,10
Portugal23 $       23.738280,63270,371285,80
Greece24 $       23.558320,55330,232580,20
Czech Republic25 $       23.359170,80280,373176,80
Poland26 $       16.640240,71260,392480,50
Hungary27 $       16.503230,73290,341484,20
Chile28 $       15.130270,63300,331883,40
Turkey29 $       15.027340,51320,273275,90
Russian Federation30 $       11.729210,76250,401783,90
Brazil31 $       11.026300,57310,312182,70
Mexico32 $       10.385310,57340,212679,80
China33 $          7.755330,51210,523465,10
South Africa34 $          7.440290,61200,563369,00
India35 $          2.104350,19350,173560,30

Data provided were used to take up the already established indexes of economic prosperity and environmental sustainability on the one hand, and to determine the indexes first presented with the Recoupling Dashboard on the other – The indexes of solidarity and agency are based on data exclusively provided.

1 Integration of Gross Domestic Product

GDP per capita (constant 2010 US$)

GDP per capita is gross domestic product divided by mid-year population. GDP is the sum of gross value added by all resident producers in the economy plus any product taxes and minus any subsidies not included in the value of the products. It is calculated without making deductions for depreciation of fabricated assets or for depletion and degradation of natural resources. Data are in constant 2010 U.S. dollars. Source: World Bank national accounts data, and OECD National Accounts data files.

2 Data Sources included in the Agency Index

Labour market insecurity (OECD)

This indicator is defined in terms of the expected earnings loss, measured as the percentage of the previous earnings, associated with unemployment. This loss depends on the risk of becoming unemployed, the expected duration of unemployment and the degree of mitigation against these losses provided by government transfers to the unemployed (effective insurance).

Vulnerable employment (World Bank)

Vulnerable employment is contributing family workers and own-account workers as a percentage of total employment.

Life Expectancy (OECD)

Life expectancy measures how long on average people could expect to live based on the age-specific death rates currently prevailing. This measure refers to people born today and is computed as a weighted average of life expectancy for men and women.

Years in Education (UNESCO)

Mean years of schooling provides the average number of years of education (primary/ISCED 1 or higher) completed by a country’s adult population (25 years and older), excluding years spent repeating grades.

Confidence in empowering institutions (OECD/Gallup World Poll)

Confidence in empowering institutions is based on the question: “In this country, do you have confidence in each of the following, or not? How about national government?” The percentage of “yes” answers is reflected here. Data comes from the Gallup World Poll and is extracted from the OECD Trust Dataset.

3 Data Sources included in the Social Solidarity Index

World Giving Index (CAF)

This index relies on a simple averaging of three giving behaviors: Helping a stranger, Donating money, Volunteering time. Each country is given a percentage score and countries are ranked on the basis of these scores. The Index measures countries by proportion of population giving.

Trust (WVS/EVS)

Trust is based on the question: Generally speaking, would you say that most people can be trusted or that you need to be careful in dealing with people? Data comes from the World Values Survey and the European Values Survey.

Social Support (OECD)

Percentage of people who report that they have friends or relatives whom they can count on in times of trouble. Data comes from the Gallup World Poll and is extracted from OECD “How’s Life.”

4 Scoring the Environmental Performance Index

Environmental Performance Index

The Environmental Performance Index (EPI) ranks countries on 24 performance indicators across ten issue categories covering environmental health and ecosystem vitality. Source: Wendling et al. (2018). Because the EPI is released biennially in even-numbered years, the reported EPI score in the baseline year (2007) is taken from the EPI report 2008. The score for 2018 is replaced with the EPI score from 2016. Because innovations in the 2018 EPI data and methodology make comparison of scores with the EPI score of 2008 difficult.

As is frequent with data projects, some of the variables included in the Recoupling Dashboard have a degree of missing data. To ensure continuity and comparability between composite scores over time, it is necessary to estimate values for these years. Missing data can be located in the interior of the available time series or at the exterior. For the former, the linear interpolation method is used – values are replaced with numbers incrementally higher or lower than the neighboring data points. For the latter, the missing values are replaced using the closest data point from source (last value carried forward – LVCF – or first value carried backward – FVCB). 

Data collected to compute the indexes are diverse. At source, the variables collected are produced on different scales, and can also have different polarities – higher is better or higher is worse. In order for them to be meaningfully combined and compared, raw data are standardized before being included in the indexes. We employ a min-max normalization whereby all raw data are transformed to a scale of 0.0-1.0 (where a score of 1.0 is the best score a country can achieve). While this constitutes an order-preserving linear transformation of the data, a score of 1.0 after normalization does not imply that a country’s score in raw data terms is perfect, but rather is the best score in the set of countries.

The authors of the Recoupling Dashboard use linear, additive aggregation and weigh each sub-component equally within its dimension.

Because the EPI is released biennially in even-numbered years, the reported EPI score in the baseline year (2007) is taken from the EPI report 2008. The score for 2018 is replaced with the EPI score from 2016. Because innovations in the 2018 EPI data and methodology make comparison of scores with the EPI score of 2008 difficult.

We invite you to participate in the discussion by downloading the paper and sharing your thoughts with us on our social media. You can follow the discussion with the hashtag #Recoupling. Please contact us with any questions: contact@global-solutions-initiative.org

Press Contact

Christoph Podewils, Director of Communications and Spokesperson
+49-172-4497959
christoph.podewils@global-solutions-initiative.org 
press@global-solutions-initiative.org

Recoupling Dashboard can be found in the Recoupling Dashboard press kit.

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