Post-85: Armenia, Belarus, China, Papua New Guinea…

Q. What do Armenia, Belarus, China, and Papua New Guinea have in common?
A. All were found to have “peacefulness levels” about equal to the USA’s.

     World Rank / Peace Index / Country
                     97th — 2.12 — Belarus
                     98th — 2.12 — Armenia
                     99th — 2.13 — United States
                     99th — 2.13 — Papua New Guinea
                     101st — 2.14 — China

From the Global Peace Index 2013. The scores range from from 1.0 (most “peaceful”) to 5.0 (least “peaceful”), and are calculated from a wide range of things, like crime, %-of-population in jail, police presence, use of state terror, “militarization” of society, weapons trade, relations with neighbors, involvement in wars [foreign or civil], political stability, etc. (See here for the data from the organization that calculated the scores).

Of the 162 countries analyzed (all the big ones), the USA tied with Papua New Guinea for 99th safest. USA’s rank was depressed due to an especially high “militarization” score. The USA’s jailed-population score is also very high, at 4.5, which is second only to North Korea’s 5.0 (the maximum possible score).

Peace Index Score 2013
. .1st — 1.16 — Iceland [Most peaceful country on Earth]
2nd — 1.21 —  Denmark
3rd — 1.24 — New Zealand
4th — 1.25 — Austria
5th — 1.27 — Switzerland
6th — 1.29 — Japan
7th — 1.30 — Finland
8th — 1.31 — Canada
9th — 1.32 — Sweden
10th– 1.34 — Belgium
11th– 1.36 — Norway
12th– 1.37 — Ireland
13th– 1.37 — Slovenia
14th– 1.40 — Czech Republic
15th– 1.43 — Germany
………………
47th– 1.82 — South Korea
………………
97th — 2.12 — Belarus
98th — 2.12 — Armenia
99th — 2.13 — United States
99th — 2.13 — Papua New Guinea
101st — 2.14 — China
………………
150th- 2.73 — Cote d’ Ivoire
150th- 2.73 — Israel
152nd- 2.75 — Yemen
153rd- 3.03 — Central African Republic
154th- 3.04 — North Korea
155th- 3.06 — Russia
………………
159th- 3.25 — Iraq
160th- 3.39 — Syria
160th- 3.39 — Somalia
162nd- 3.44 — Afghanistan [Least peaceful country on Earth]
________________________________________________

What exactly does it mean that Papua New Guinea has an identical “peace score” to the USA? Does it mean people are equally safe in both places? No, because crime is just one parameter of many. (Papua New Guinea is actually much more dangerous in terms of crime, I see from the data.) Maybe the data behind the peace-score is so wide-ranging as to be useless, in the end.

A commenter points out out a methodological problem in line with what I mean: “The idea of ranking nation-states’ contribution (or lack of it) to global peace, when the relative military power of those states ranges from Nauru to United States, is…obviously idiotic…” — Actually, Nauru is not one of the analyzed countries, but his point is valid. USA’s Militarization does depress its score. It’s easy for Iceland to get near 1.0 on militarization, because it has no standing army. Of the top 15 (above), most have benefited, for nearly 70 years now (after 1945), from the USA guaranteeing their security — via military aid, troop presences in Europe, and NATO Article 5. On top of this, none of the top 15 (possibly excluding Japan [NK] and Slovenia [the Yugoslav wars]), that I can tell, have had even the faintest pretense of a real external security threat after 1990.