Rule of law

How this is measured

Whether laws are transparently and consistently enforced by an independent judiciary, and whether officials — including the executive — are actually subject to them. Combines court independence, compliance with judgments, and the level of corruption in the civil service. Because it is coded by country experts and then put through a measurement model, every value is an estimate with a credible interval around it. V-Dem publishes those intervals; this site shows only the point estimate, so how firm any single number is cannot be read off the screen. The intervals are wider where fewer experts coded a country and in the earlier centuries, which is exactly where the long series is most tempting to read closely.

163 countries and territories have a figure for 2025. This is the most recent year the series covers well; the viewer holds every year from 1789.

Data by year

Source and licence

Other government statistics