Andrey Illarionov: "The first dictatorship of Europe"

"The Cato Institute published the fourth annual report on the state of the human freedom index in the world according to the available data for 2016. In detail about the essence of the index, its components and the indicators usedwere described in this blog earlier," writes the economist and former adviser to the president in the Living Journal .

"The most important results of the fourth report are the following:

1. The average ICR of human freedom (ICH) continued its decrease - from 7.05 in 2008 to 6.99 in 2016.

2. The first place in terms of the ICHS for the past three years (2014-2016) is occupied by New Zealand.

3. The leader of the world ranking of the Ministry of ICH in 2008-2013. Hong Kong, who lost the first place of New Zealand in 2014, in 2016 sank another step lower, now taking third place in the world and missing Switzerland to second place.

4. Russia from 100th place in the world in 2008 sank to 119th place in 2016 (162 countries of the world are in the 2016 ranking).

5. The fourth report uses a new (revolutionary) classification of European countries - in a group of Eastern European countries along with its traditional members (post -communist states of Central and Eastern Europe), Greece and Cyprus are also included for the first time.

6. According to the indicator of personal freedom (the most important component of the Ministry of Economic Council-along with the index of economic freedom) among all European countries, Russia occupies the last, 40s, place.

The personal freedom index includes 41 personal and civil freedoms in the seven areas of human life and activity:

- safety,

- The rule of law,

- Freedom of movement,

- freedom of religious practice,

- freedom of expression and information,

- freedom of associations and civil society,

- Freedom of choice of identity and personal relationships.

7. The result achieved by Russia is especially indicative of the background of inclusion in the fourth report of data on Belarus, sometimes called the "last dictatorship in Europe." It turned out that in terms of personal freedom index in 2016, Belarus is still higher than our country, which allows us to rightfully call present Russia the first dictatorship of Europe. "