Countries with engaged societies tend to score higher on democracy and human rights.
Comparing Human rights index vs electoral democracy index with Engaged society score across 173 countries, 1948–2025.
- Rank correlation
- +0.78
- Holding size constant
- +0.77
- Countries compared
- 173
- Period
- 1948–2025
What might link these
Engaged societies may foster democratic institutions and protect rights through civic participation, but wealthier nations could also afford both higher engagement and better rights records. A careful reader should note that correlation does not imply causation.
Why this is not proof of anything
This is a correlation across countries, not an experiment. It cannot show that either indicator causes the other, and both may simply follow a third thing. Democracy and human rights measures may themselves influence societal engagement, creating circularity in interpretation.
The second figure above repeats the measurement with national population and income held constant. It is the more conservative number: a relationship that largely disappears there was mostly telling you that larger, richer countries have more of most things.
How this was measured
Both indicators were ranked across every country reporting each, and the two rankings compared — ranks rather than raw values, because a handful of very large countries can otherwise manufacture a relationship on their own. The calculation is arithmetic over figures already published on this site; the commentary above is drafted from the two indicator names and the resulting coefficients.