Democracy in Asia

Map of V-Dem Electoral Democracy Index for 2024 in Asia

0.900–1.000   0.800–0.899   0.700–0.799

0.600–0.699   0.500–0.599   0.400–0.499

0.300–0.399   0.200–0.299   0.100–0.199

0.000–0.099   No data

Democracy in Asia can be comparatively assessed ^[1] according to various definitions of democracy. ^[2] According to the V-Dem Democracy indices, the Asian countries with the highest democracy scores in year 2023 were Taiwan, Japan, Cyprus, Israel, and South Korea, meanwhile the Asian countries with lowest democracy scores in 2023 are Saudi Arabia, China and Afghanistan. ^[3] Democratic backsliding can be observed in parts of Asia. ^[4] The V-Dem Democracy Report identified for the year 2023 East Timor as a case of stand-alone democratization and Thailand and Maldives as cases of U-Turn democratization. ^[5]

By country

• Democracy in Afghanistan
• Democracy in Bangladesh
• Democracy in Bhutan
• Democracy in China
  • Democracy in Hong Kong
• Democracy in India
• Democracy in Iraq
• Democracy in Pakistan

Measures of democracy

The table below shows Asian countries scored on V-Dem Democracy indices for year 2024. ^{[6] [7] [8]}

V-Dem Democracy Indices

Country	Democracy Indices		Democracy Component Indices
	Electoral	Liberal	Liberal	Egalitarian	Participatory	Deliberative
Japan	0.82	0.734	0.902	0.934	0.562	0.908
Taiwan	0.8	0.7	0.878	0.874	0.748	0.844
Cyprus	0.774	0.651	0.839	0.902	0.566	0.831
East Timor	0.733	0.549	0.72	0.569	0.552	0.715
South Korea	0.729	0.631	0.872	0.856	0.61	0.809
Israel	0.715	0.617	0.869	0.808	0.601	0.773
Nepal	0.669	0.522	0.76	0.585	0.583	0.611
Sri Lanka	0.664	0.486	0.699	0.671	0.594	0.617
Armenia	0.623	0.414	0.61	0.802	0.411	0.688
Maldives	0.564	0.423	0.714	0.584	0.48	0.705
Bhutan	0.561	0.454	0.783	0.826	0.541	0.899
Malaysia	0.517	0.362	0.643	0.709	0.538	0.673
Mongolia	0.496	0.389	0.736	0.653	0.402	0.746
Indonesia	0.483	0.326	0.606	0.538	0.592	0.811
Georgia	0.48	0.328	0.615	0.726	0.507	0.751
Papua New Guinea	0.461	0.384	0.784	0.461	0.514	0.507
Philippines	0.435	0.308	0.633	0.314	0.571	0.526
Singapore	0.414	0.343	0.752	0.805	0.132	0.742
India	0.398	0.291	0.635	0.425	0.521	0.629
Thailand	0.389	0.289	0.646	0.483	0.356	0.371
Iraq	0.351	0.228	0.524	0.459	0.438	0.594
Lebanon	0.348	0.207	0.463	0.379	0.421	0.557
Kyrgyzstan	0.333	0.183	0.411	0.619	0.397	0.373
Pakistan	0.313	0.199	0.48	0.223	0.499	0.529
Kuwait	0.292	0.266	0.716	0.613	0.148	0.433
Turkey	0.288	0.117	0.255	0.539	0.422	0.182
Jordan	0.273	0.274	0.772	0.577	0.302	0.876
Kazakhstan	0.272	0.134	0.326	0.539	0.291	0.5
Uzbekistan	0.215	0.078	0.19	0.435	0.196	0.422
Palestine (West Bank)	0.214	0.117	0.323	0.541	0.469	0.177
Bangladesh	0.201	0.068	0.2	0.323	0.243	0.293
Cambodia	0.186	0.056	0.133	0.206	0.207	0.183
Azerbaijan	0.175	0.054	0.133	0.34	0.102	0.093
Tajikistan	0.174	0.05	0.12	0.197	0.144	0.136
Vietnam	0.174	0.124	0.382	0.614	0.499	0.659
Oman	0.174	0.14	0.443	0.571	0.388	0.189
Russia	0.172	0.056	0.143	0.371	0.376	0.109
Hong Kong	0.169	0.133	0.421	0.736	0.142	0.15
Iran	0.167	0.092	0.275	0.473	0.092	0.324
Turkmenistan	0.149	0.033	0.076	0.289	0.075	0.039
Syria	0.145	0.054	0.155	0.23	0.194	0.085
Laos	0.134	0.102	0.339	0.428	0.386	0.164
Yemen	0.127	0.047	0.142	0.087	0.166	0.132
Bahrain	0.124	0.052	0.158	0.385	0.115	0.158
United Arab Emirates	0.103	0.078	0.27	0.45	0.086	0.298
Palestine (Gaza)	0.095	0.053	0.18	0.405	0.212	0.113
Qatar	0.087	0.08	0.284	0.395	0.105	0.387
North Korea	0.083	0.014	0.033	0.31	0.153	0.016
Myanmar	0.083	0.016	0.041	0.21	0.34	0.195
Afghanistan	0.081	0.016	0.044	0.077	0.027	0.073
China	0.073	0.036	0.125	0.302	0.1	0.227
Saudi Arabia	0.015	0.047	0.187	0.449	0.081	0.258

See also

• Democracy in Africa
• Democracy in the Americas
• Democracy in Europe
• Democracy in the Middle East and North Africa
• Democratic backsliding by country – Asia

References

1. Geissel, Brigitte; Kneuer, Marianne; Lauth, Hans-Joachim (2016). "Measuring the quality of democracy: Introduction" . International Political Science Review . 37 (5). Sage Publications: 571–579. doi:10.1177/0192512116669141. ISSN   0192-5121. JSTOR   26556872. S2CID   151808737 . Retrieved 2023-04-03.
2. Greenwood, Shannon (2022-12-06). "Appendix A: Classifying democracies". Pew Research Center's Global Attitudes Project. Retrieved 2022-12-27.
3. V-Dem Institute (2023). "The V-Dem Dataset" . Retrieved 14 October 2023.
4. Croissant, Aurel; Haynes, Jeffrey (2021). "Democratic regression in Asia: Introduction" . Democratization. 28: 1–21. doi:10.1080/13510347.2020.1851203.
5. Nord, Marina; Lundstedt, Martin; Altman, David; Angiolillo, Fabio; et al. (2024). Lindberg, Staffan I. (ed.). Democracy Report 2024: Democracy Winning and Losing at the Ballot (PDF) (Report). University of Gothenburg: V-Dem Institute.
6. "Democracy Report 2025, 25 Years of Autocratization – Democracy Trumped?" (PDF). Retrieved 14 March 2025.
7. "The V-Dem Dataset – V-Dem". V-Dem. V-Dem Institute. 2025. Retrieved 14 March 2025.
8. Coppedge, Michael; Gerring, John; Glynn, Adam; Knutsen, Carl Henrik; Lindberg, Staffan I.; et al. (January 2020). Varieties of Democracy: Measuring Two Centuries of Political Change. Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/9781108347860. ISBN   9781108347860.