The 2011 Legatum Prosperity Index™
Oxford Analytica is the research partner of the Legatum Institute, a London-based public policy group, for the Prosperity Index and has contributed to the methodology and analysis of the Index since its inception.
About the Index
The Legatum Prosperity Index™ provides the world’s only global assessment of prosperity based on both income and wellbeing. The purpose of the index is to promote a holistic understanding of national prosperity by providing a framework for its measurement that will be useful to policymakers, scholars, and the globally curious.
Traditional measures of national prosperity are based entirely on indicators of a country’s income, represented either by Gross Domestic Product (GDP) or by average income per person (GDP/capita). Yet for many people, ‘prosperity’ is not just about money, it is about satisfaction with our lives and our future prospects. Thus, recent efforts to ‘move beyond GDP’ have focused on wellbeing, happiness, social mobility, and other indicators to the exclusion of wealth.
What makes the Prosperity Index unique is its focus on both dimensions. It is the first global index to provide an empirical framework for prosperity as a complex blend of both income and wellbeing.
2011 Findings
INDEX INSIGHT 1
Arab Spring Countries Could Look to Indonesia and Malaysia
There can be no single model for the post-revolutionary Middle East and North Africa. While Turkey may be a model for some, Arab Spring countries could look to Indonesia and Malaysia.
INDEX INSIGHT 2
Freeing the Entrepreneurial Spirit of Africa
African citizens are among the most optimistic in the world for entrepreneurship. Yet, this resource remains underused because of various constraints, most notably poor infrastructure.
INDEX INSIGHT 3
India vs. China: Who is Best Positioned to Tackle Corruption?
Both countries are plagued by similar levels of corruption. But, ultimately, India – with its open democratic society – is better placed than China to tackle this crippling problem.
INDEX INSIGHT 4
The European Crisis: Time to Rethink Integration?
The European project is in crisis. The Prosperity Index suggests that top-down integration has done little to equalise differences among European countries.
