UPSC PERSPECTIVE Mains Paper 2: Polity – Comparison of the Indian constitutional scheme with that of other countries Important for Prelims as well DEMOCRACY INDEX 2018 The eleventh edition of the Democracy Index reveals that political participation is on the rise in almost every region of the world. Whilst clearly disillusioned with formal political institutions, the population has turned anger into action, and turned out to vote, and to protest. The most striking advance has been in the participation of women DEMOCRACY INDEX 2018 The Democracy Index is an index compiled by the UK-based company the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) is a British business within the Economist Group 2018 RANKINGS INDIA’S PERFORMANCE • India is ranked at 41 – a notch above last year. • It is still classified as a ‘flawed democracy’ according to the index. • India achieved a score of 7.23 on the index to maintain its position – the same it did last year. • India ranks below the US (ranked 25th in the index) and other so called ‘flawed democracies’ like Italy, France, Botswana and South Africa. FLAWED DEMOCRACY Flawed democracies are nations where elections are fair and free and basic civil liberties are honoured but may have issues (e.g. media freedom infringement). Nonetheless, these nations have significant faults in other democratic aspects, including underdeveloped political culture, low levels of participation in politics, and issues in the functioning of governance HOW INDIA WAS JUDGED
