Closing thoughts: to rank or not to rank?

The last chapter of the monograph pulls together some of the findings of the research and provides some thoughts on the future of the use of index-based country rankings. The chapter notes how the ‘league table’ style of ranking countries using indices is popular, and no doubt will continue to be so. As organisations continue to create and publish indices for countries then someone will seek to use them to create rankings, as inappropriate as this may or may not be. There are dangers associated with over-simplifying the world in this way and, of course, they can be created by anyone with an especial agenda to promote. The chapter explores some alternatives to index-based rankings, such as the use of sub-tables (or what some refer to as ‘tiered’ groupings) of peer-group countries or the avoidance of rankings across all countries with an emphasis instead on changes for a single country, but concludes that these are unlikely to replace the popularity of global benchmarking. The chapter ends by making some suggestions for future research in this important and growing field.