Among war, terrorism, brutal dictatorships and other drops in democratic standards, the state of freedom worsened in nearly every part of the world in 2014, according to a new report.
Discarding Democracy: A Return to the Iron Fist, published late last month by independent watchdog organization Freedom House, found an overall decline in political rights and civil liberties across the globe for the ninth year in a row. Only 2.87 billion people -- 40% of the world's population -- live in the 89 countries the organization has designated as "free."
The report also found that 55 countries are "partly free," home to 1.72 billion people (24% of the global population), and 51 countries are "not free," with 2.6 billion people (36% of the global population). However, in the case of "not free" countries, more than half of those 2.6 billion people live in just one nation: China.
The designations of "free," "partly free" and "not free" are based on a number of criteria. Each country or territory is assigned two numerical ratings for its level of political rights and civil liberties, 1 meaning the highest degree of freedom and 7 meaning the lowest. A combined average between 1 and 2.5 means "free"; between 3 and 5 means "partly free"; and between 5.5 and 7 means "not free."
The following chart, created by statistics portal Statista, illustrates the level of freedom each country has.
