Across 188 countries, Civil liberties (FH) and Regulatory quality rise and fall together at r = -0.63 (on a scale from −1 to +1, where 0 means no link). Comparing only countries with similar income (GDP per person) leaves r = -0.48, which could easily be chance (q = 0.085, allowing for the many pairs tested, and allowing for countries in the same region being alike).
Comparing countries across the middle half of civil liberties (fh), 2 to 5 points, regulatory quality is worse by 0.884 points at the top of that range than the bottom. Comparing only countries with similar national income, the gap is 0.466 points.
Link before adjusting (r)-0.630p = 3.8e-22 · 188 countries
After adjusting for national income-0.481p = 3.2e-12 · likely range [-0.58, -0.36]
p, allowing for regions0.013standard error 0.138 · 7 regions
Check for luck (q)0.085across 12,497 pairs
How to read these.r runs from −1 (one goes up as the other goes down) to +1 (they rise together), and 0 means no link. Adjusting for national income means comparing countries with the same GDP per person, so differences in wealth can’t explain the link. Income is used in percentage terms, since an extra $1,000 means more to a poor country than to a rich one. p is how likely a link this strong would be if there were really none. Below 0.05 means it is unlikely to be chance. Very small values are written in short form: 1.1e-32 means a decimal point followed by 31 zeros and then 11, so very close to zero. The likely range is where the true figure probably lies, and a range that crosses zero means the link could easily be chance. Countries in the same region tend to resemble each other, so the third figure allows for that, which gives a fairer p. The standard error is the typical size of the error in r. Finally, testing this many pairs means some will look strong by luck alone. A q below 0.05 means this link is unlikely to be one of those.
Civil liberties (FH) · rating (1-7, 1 = most free)link with income -0.49 · moderate
Regulatory quality · index (approx. -2.5 to 2.5)link with income +0.83 · proxy
“Link with income” is how closely each measure tracks GDP per person across countries, from −1 to +1.
Every country as a dot
best-fit line line after adjusting
Four ways to measure the link
Method
r
p
Countries
Standard (Pearson), not adjusted
-0.630
3.8e-22
188
By rank (Spearman), not adjusted
-0.634
1.5e-22
188
Standard (Pearson), adjusted for national income
-0.481
3.2e-12
188
By rank (Spearman), adjusted for national income
-0.472
9.1e-12
188
The rank version uses only each country’s place in line, from lowest to highest, so a few extreme countries count for less. The adjusted and unadjusted versions use the same 188 countries: those that report both measures and GDP per person. So the gap between them comes from the adjustment, not from a change in which countries are counted. Drop in the size of r after adjusting: +0.148 (a minus sign means it grew).
How solid is it?
Leaving out one country at a time, r ranges from -0.499 (without RWA) to -0.460 (without BLR). The bar above shows that range on a scale from −1 to +1, with the solid line at the full result. The single country that moves r most: BLR (+0.021).
Within each region
Countries are not separate, unrelated cases, and neighbors share a lot. A link that holds inside each region is far more believable than one that shows up only when comparing regions.
n
r
East Asia & Pacific
30
-0.67
Europe & Central Asia
51
-0.66
Latin America & Caribbean
32
-0.44
Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan & Pakistan
21
-0.24
Sub-Saharan Africa
46
-0.61
By income third
If the link shows up only in the richest third of countries, it is a feature of rich countries, not a general pattern.
n
r
Poorest third
63
-0.47
Middle third
62
-0.60
Richest third
63
-0.44
By largest religious group
Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.
n
r
Christians
109
-0.49
Muslims
49
-0.38
By last european coloniser
Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.
n
r
France
25
-0.55
Never a European colony
21
-0.66
Spain
20
-0.49
United Kingdom
63
-0.40
Without outliers (countries far outside the middle half of countries on either measure, by more than one and a half times the width of that middle half): r = -0.481 after dropping 0 countries.
Two series, one country
Both measures over the years for one country you pick. The two charts are stacked so they share only the years along the bottom.
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Over time, within countries
Everything above compares countries with each other at one moment. This section compares each country only with itself over 29years. So a link here can’t come from anything about a country that stays the same, such as its history, geography, institutions or culture.
The link also shows up within countries over time (r = -0.199). It holds even when looking only at changes from one year to the next (r = -0.066). This is the strongest kind of evidence available here: it holds when each country is compared only with itself, and it is not just a product of shared trends.
Across countries (adjusted)-0.481for comparison
Within countries-0.244each country vs itself
…and vs the same year elsewhere-0.199q = 0.000 · 197 countries
Year-on-year changes-0.066q = 0.004
Read with care.
Almost all of this indicator's variation is between countries, not within them, so the within-country estimate rests on a small part of the data.
4,982 country-years (one country in one year), 197 countries, 1996–2024, about 25 years each on average. Share of the variation that happens within countries over time: 6% for Civil liberties (FH), 6% for Regulatory quality. The margins of error allow for each country appearing many times, and for each year’s value being close to the year before.
Year-to-year changes are a cautious test, not a final answer. Looking only at changes from one year to the next removes each country’s own trends. But it also makes measurement mistakes louder, which pulls the results toward zero. A near-zero result here is weak evidence of no link, not proof.
With one measure years behind the other
Same year (lag 0): -0.199. A peak away from zero does not show which comes first. These series change slowly — this year’s value is close to last year’s. That makes the curve smooth and nearly symmetric, whatever produced the data. Even a sharp peak at one lag (a gap of some years) would not prove that one measure changes the other.
The data
rating (1-7, 1 = most free)
index (approx. -2.5 to 2.5)
Years
Turkmenistan TKM
7
-1.69
2025, 2024
Tajikistan TJK
7
-0.759
2025, 2024
Somalia, Fed. Rep. SOM
7
-1.73
2025, 2024
Sudan SDN
7
-1.66
2025, 2024
Myanmar MMR
7
-1.42
2025, 2024
Iran, Islamic Rep. IRN
7
-1.51
2025, 2024
Equatorial Guinea GNQ
7
-1.4
2025, 2024
Central African Republic CAF
7
-1.27
2025, 2024
Belarus BLR
7
-1.23
2025, 2024
Azerbaijan AZE
7
0.135
2025, 2024
Afghanistan AFG
7
-1.54
2025, 2024
Viet Nam VNM
6
-0.267
2025, 2024
Uzbekistan UZB
6
-0.527
2025, 2024
Turkiye TUR
6
-0.211
2025, 2024
Chad TCD
6
-1.09
2025, 2024
Freedom House, Freedom in the World Kaufmann, D. and A. Kraay, Worldwide Governance Indicators, World Bank
Freedom House · via Our World in Data · Free to use with attribution · updated annual
Scored 1 to 7, where 1 is most free. Covers freedom of speech and belief, the right to form groups, the rule of law and personal freedom. The same expert review process produces the political rights rating, so the two are bound to match closely.
Data used: most recent value in 2010-2025; values come from 2015–2025. To adjust for income, each measure is first predicted from GDP per person (in percentage terms, on a log scale) with a straight-line fit. Only what is left over is then compared. This is called a partial correlation. The line is drawn the standard way (ordinary least squares), which picks the line that comes closest to all the countries at once. The error margins allow for countries in the same region resembling each other, using 7 World Bank regions. The q-value corrects for testing all 12,497 pairs at once, using the Benjamini–Hochberg method. Underlying data last updated DYB 2024. How the country data works · explore Civil liberties (FH) and Regulatory quality
This page shows that two measures go together. It does not show that Civil liberties (FH) changes Regulatory quality, or the reverse. These figures also describe countries, not individual people. See the ecological fallacy.
More links with Civil liberties (FH) or Regulatory quality