What Do Global Metrics Tell Us about the World?

There are now a wide variety of global indicators that measure different economic, political and social attributes of countries in the world. This paper seeks to answer two questions. First, what is the degree of overlap between these different measures? Are they, in fact, measuring the same underlying dimension? To answer this question, we employ a principal component analysis (PCA) to 15 indices across 145 countries. The results demonstrate that there is one underlying dimension that combines economic development and social progress with state stability. Second, how do countries score on this dimension? The results of the PCA allow us to produce categorical divisions of the world. The threefold division identifies a world composed of what we describe and map as rich, poor and middle countries. A five-group classification provided a more nuanced categorization described as: The very rich, free and stable; affluent and free; upper middle; lower middle; poor and not free.