Study Brulé & Veenhoven (2014a): study ZZ Developed nations 2000
- Public
- Adults, developed nations, 2000
- Survey name
- Pooled surveys
- Sample
- Respondents
- N = 240000
- Non Response
- Assessment
- Multiple assesment methods
Correlate
- Authors's Label
- Social freedom
- Our Classification
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- Related specification variables
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- Operationalization
- Social freedom is about the opportunity to choose and denotes the absence of restrictions imposed by other people. It includes political, private, and economic freedom.
A: Political freedom refers to civil liberties. Respect of civil liberties in nations is estimated on the basis of expert ratings of eleven aspects:
- Free and independent media
- Open public discussion, free private discussion
- Freedom of assembly and demonstration
- Freedom of political organization
- Equal law, non-discriminatory judiciary
- Protection from political terror
- Free trade unions, effective collective bargaining
- Free professional and other private organizations
- Free business
- Free religion
- Personal freedoms such as gender equality, property rights, freedom of movement, choice of residence, choice of marriage, and size of family.
Scores are between 1 (highest degree of freedom) and 7 (least amount of freedom).
B: Private freedom is measured by:
- Number of legal grounds for abortion in a country. A higher number indicates more freedom.
- Freedom of marriage, which includes 'legal restrictions to interracial, interreligious, or civil marriage' and 'equality of sexes during marriage and for divorce proceedings'. Ranking is by Humana (1992) on a scale of 1 to 4.
- Freedom of travel, which includes freedom to travel in own country and freedom to travel outside the country. Ranking is by Humana (1992), on a scale of 1 to 4.
C: Economic freedom is measured using the Economic Freedom of the World (EFW) Index and the Freedom House Index. The EFW index by Gwartney and Lawson (2006). The first index was referred to as the Fraser Index. It contains 38 components designed to measure the degree to which a nation's institutions and policies are consistent with voluntary exchange, protection of property rights, access to sound money, freedom to trade internationally, regulation of credit labour and business. Data for 2006 is used in this study. The Freedom House Index developed by Messick and Kimura (1996) is based on six criteria: freedom to hold property, freedom to earn a living, freedom to operate a business, freedom to invest one's earnings, freedom to trade internationally, and freedom to participate in the market economy. The index ranges from 0 (lowest freedom) to 16 (most freedom). Data for the years 1995-1996 are used in this study.