Talk:Freedom in the World

This article is not biased

I don't see why the neutrality of this article is disputed. The actual ranking itself may be biased, but that does not mean the article that merely lists the results is biased. If this article is called "Ranking of freedom" and it pretended Freedom House was the sole authority on freedom, then it would be biased, but it isn't. Hypothetically speaking if Adolph Hitler made a freedom ranking and it was notable enough, then it would deserve an article here. That doesn't mean the ranking itself is neutral.

Freedom House is a notable ranking because it is taken seriously by some, and besides the Economist's Index of Democracy there isn't an "overall" (i.e. not press or economic") rating out there: see list. If Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch wants to make their own rankings, they'll be listed there too - but they haven't as far as I know.

From the list Freedom House appears to be credible because their rankings correlate with the other rankings. Someone pointed out that having the US as "free" and Russia as "not free" is biased, but the other indices rank Russia lower than the US too. Are we going to say that the Canadian Fraser Institute, French Reporters Without Borders, and British The Economist are run by American "neocons" too? I should also point out that if you look at their country reports, they're well aware of Gitmo and the Patriot Act, it's not like they're just heaping praise on the US.

Hypertall (talk) 02:34, 1 October 2007 (UTC) Freedom House is propaganda US is ranked 49th in freedom of the press and 21st in personal freedom 18:43, 26 June 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.78.124.104 (talk)

"Unrepresentative" in definition of democracy

I do not know if I have to change it since I did not put it in the "electoral democracy" definition in "Freedom in the World 2007", and there was no link to check it, so I put it here: "3. Regularly contested elections conducted in conditions of ballot secrecy, reasonable ballot security, and in the absence of massive voter fraud that yields results that are unrepresentative of the public will;" No dae 12:11, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Second paragraph introduces bias

I think the problem with this article is the second paragraph. It is essentially just a quote from Freedom House and as such makes the article biased in favour of Freedom House. The paragraph should either be removed or another paragraph quoting an alternative source should be introduced. Otherwise the article looks like a mouthpiece for Freedom House's POV. Pexise 21:58, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

There is no prohibition in Wikipedia against such quoting. If you want to clarify, you might add, "According to Freedom House..."Ultramarine 22:01, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

That is not the point, I am questioning whether the paragraph belongs in this article. Pexise 22:04, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

NPOV states that all views should be presented. That includes FHs view. If you want to add other views, that fine.Ultramarine 22:05, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Could someone other than Ultramarine offer their opinion on this? I am concerned that Ultramarine does not have a neutral stance concerning this topic (see discussion on Freedom House entry.) Pexise 08:50, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Spare me the ad hominem. What is important is Wikipedia policy, like WP:NPOV, not the personal opinions of anonymous Wikipedia editors, my own or others.Ultramarine 09:01, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

• From WP:NPOV "The policy requires that, where there are or have been conflicting views, these should be presented fairly. None of the views should be given undue weight..." Pexise 09:33, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Again, if you feel a view is missing, add it. Obviously the view of FH is relevant regarding their own report.Ultramarine 09:36, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Me: 'That is not the point, I am questioning whether the paragraph belongs in this article.'Pexise 09:49, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Me: 'Could someone other than Ultramarine offer their opinion on this?' Pexise 09:49, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

You have offered no explanation for why a valid view should be removed. Looking at the edits you have made in Wikipedia, they have only been about criticizing FH, nothing else, so I am also concerned that you do "not have a neutral stance concerning this topic"Ultramarine 09:54, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

• From WP:NPOV "The policy requires that, where there are or have been conflicting views, these should be presented fairly. None of the views should be given undue weight..." 84.12.87.164 10:07, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
  • The first edit by an IP. From NPOV "The neutral point of view is a means of dealing with conflicting views. The policy requires that, where there are or have been conflicting views, these should be presented fairly. None of the views should be given undue weight or asserted as being the truth, and all significant published points of view are to be presented, not just the most popular one. It should also not be asserted that the most popular view or some sort of intermediate view among the different views is the correct one. Readers are left to form their own opinions. As the name suggests, the neutral point of view is a point of view, not the absence or elimination of viewpoints. It is a point of view that is neutral; that is neither sympathetic nor in opposition to its subject."Ultramarine 10:11, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
    • I would actually agree with Pexise that the second paragraph isn't really needed, though not because it is inherently bias. It seems like an in-depth discussion of Freedom House's financial sources, and critisisms of Freedom House as whole should be put into the main Freedom House article, not this sub-article. Maybe a line that specifically points readers to that page for more information about the organization as a whole.

As a side note, while Freedom House as a whole gets a lot of its money from the Government, the Freedom in the World report is privately funded, not government funded. So this discussion of government funding seems particularly moot here, and like it belongs in the main article. 63.138.81.98 16:59, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

• • • • Exactly - that was my point. Perhaps the paragraph could be replaced with a line such as: "There is some debate over the neutrality of Freedom House and the methodology used for the FITW report - see main article Freedom House." Pexise 08:41, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

BTW - it is interesting that you mention that Freedom in World is privately funded, indeed making the discussion about govternment funding even less relevant here. Although I would argue that this does not make FITW an 'independent' piece of research - far from it. Pexise 08:41, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

• • • • • Agree we can remove this paragraph, but then the "predominantly US-funded", at the start of the article, should also be removed.Ultramarine 08:47, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
        • I will leave the question of the independence of the report alone. But I would say that including the paragraph without mentioning the funding sources for the report in particular in this article leaves the impression that the report itself is funded by the US government, which just isn't true. I would agree that we should replace the paragraph about the funding with the sentence you suggested... as to removing the "predominately US-funded" I would agree that either we should remove it, or we should add a more neutral description of Freedom House... apparently, "Predominately US-Funded" is a reason not to trust them; non-partisian or something would be a reason to trust them... maybe we could say the "US-based non-profit organization" which is somewhat less loaded, and how they are described on the main Freedom House article, I think. 63.138.81.98 17:07, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
          • Thank you for your opinion, it could not be otherwise, considering you are a Freedom House employee. I used WikiScanner (http://wikiscanner.virgil.gr/) and came up with your address (63.138.81.98) for Freedom House. Please make explicit you work for Freedom House and do not try to pose as another unbiased and unrelated Wikipedia editor. It is unfair. Schizophonix 10:44, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

"predominately US-funded"

It says this in the intro, does it need to be in EVERY caption for the maps? Seems a little POV to me "It is US-based, so take it with a grain of salt". user:Pzg Ratzinger

Indeed, once in the intro is enough. —Nightstallion (?) 19:02, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

de-facto single party states

What about countries with de-facto one=party systems? Would South Africa not qualify? There is little powersharing mechanisms in that country and the ANC dominates all organs of state. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 212.41.142.242 (talk) 10:42, 22 March 2007 (UTC).

Thailand

Hi. Mysteriously, Thailand with PR 2 and CL at 3, was marked as "Partly Free", yet India and Indonedia, with the same numbers were listed as "Free". According to Freedom House, Thailand is listed as "Free". I have changed Thailand's listing on the page to reflect this more accurately. I did not change the map, because it is from 2005, as the filename reflects. Should a new map for the 2006 data be made?

A correction - Thailand was rated PR 3, CL 3, "Partly Free" in the survey and the map is correct. --Acntx 19:32, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

What Survey? The link to the PDF file leads to a 404, so this claim cannot be found. At the FreedomHouse website, I searched through all years on their "Map of freedom" and Thailand has never been listed as "Partly Free". Can you can show me a valid link to the survey that lists it as such? If not, it needs to reflect what is actaully on the FreedomHouse site.

I updated the PDF file link. On the first page of the essay, it notes that Thailand was downgraded from "Free" to "Partly Free" in the 2006 survey. At this link [1], on Page 11, Thailand's declining political rights score is confirmed. Freedom House does not post the detailed country-by-country summaries from its most recent survey until late in the following year and this information is not yet available for 2006. --Acntx 20:41, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification. And thanks to Thaksin For everything else :-/

Thailand is indeed only partly free but actually Indonesia is also only partly free.--Aitor Ayala (talk) 17:21, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Russia

Why is russia not even considerd partly free?

• The article is somewhat misleading, apparently Freedom House is a neo-conservative organization. Nothing Russia or Cuba can do will put them on good terms with neo-conservatives. Basically, it's more useful as a measurement of agreement with neo-conservative politics than actual freedom. I'm not really convinced that this is a balanced study at all, why is America given top marks even after passing things like the Patriot Act and the alleged voting fraud of the 2004 elections? Oh yeah, FREEDOM!!!! Does this really belong on Wikipedia? Too POV. ≈Superbeatles™ 01:12, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
• Yes, it does belong on Wikipedia, even if you or I disagree with it. The organization may be biased, but conservatives would argue that Amnesty International is biased, or CNN, or BBC. These rankings are cited all over Wikipedia. Besides, no one really should edit the rankings, considering its an established list--Thomas.macmillan 13:13, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't mind having this on wikipedia as long as there are bias warnings all over it. We should also look into getting some other sources that measure similar statistics. I don't claim to be an expert, but in my estimation totalitarian, religious states such as Israel should be considered partly free, along with nations in which certain members of the population don't feel safe due to allegations of election fraud. These might include, America, Briton, and France (Russia is already condidered not free, otherwise it would be on that list). Due to the extensive welfare, and healthcare at first world levels cuba should be partly free, there's no democracy but the system has freed people from extreme poverty.-Oranged

Regarding why Russia is considered unfree, see this: [2] Other nations can be found by changing the drop-down choice.Ultramarine 09:24, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

I have removed this from lists of countries as it is a report not a Wikipedia NPOV list of countries.

It is a respected list often used in research on democracy.Ultramarine 19:04, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

This is ridiculous. It does not need to have bias tags "all over it." Other articles are not treated like that. If someone has sources that differ from Freedom House, please write it into the criticism section on Freedom House's page. As for it being a conservative organization, I will remind all that it was founded by by liberal lions like Eleanor Roosevelt and has used the same criteria for decades (since before neocons had any influence in D.C. or elsewhere. --Tjss(Talk) 21:24, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

well i am sure that if russia, cuba, venezuela, iran opened up their markets to the terms and conditions of u.s. corporations, they would micraculasly become free all of a sudden, according to the "freedom" house. The "freedom" house follows the same bias that wikipedia does in general and favours those countries that take orders from the usa. in singapore, you cant even look at porn, yet it is listed as partly free. this is also a country that canes people for spray painting graffiti. you are 6 times as likely to go to prison in the usa than you are in china, yet the usa is listed in the 'free" category, while china is not. israel is also listed as free, and thats one of the most authoritarian countries i know of. my conclusion is that the list is not credible, and that people need to do their own research and find out the truth. i will give credit that many of the european countries where you cant get arrested for drugs, or prostitution are quite free, but as far as freedom of press, i find that the western european press is quite limited, unreliable, and that you might be better off going to russian, cuban, venezuelan, and iranian sources if you want the truth that doesnt involve the corporate interest of western companies. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 987979d87897897 (talk • contribs) 06:23, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

@ 987979d87897897 you cant compare Russia and Venezuela with Cuba and Iran. Russia and Venezuela are Illiberal Democracies, Cuba is an authoritarian State and Iran is a totalitarian Theocracy.--Aitor Ayala (talk) 17:19, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

hate speech ban

Most Countries in Western Europe (like Britain), plus some others, like Canada and Australia have bans on hate speech, as well as on some forms of demonstrations and rallies along similar lines. There is a page on Wikipedia that mentions this. Wouldn't Countries with laws such as those be less than entireley free if certain speech is prohibited?205.188.116.9 03:46, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• This only covers the rankings given by Freedom House in 2006 according to their own criteria. Those concerns on the qualifications on free speech in some nations (with a specific given example being the illegality in some European nations of Holocaust denial) are expressed in the main Freedom House article. --Kitch 20:34, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Freedom vs Socialist Democracies

I am concerned about the presumption that this article attempts to portray other countries on a equal standing with the United States as "free" Countries. The United States is the only country that its people possess "certain, inalienable rights.

All other countries you have listed as free are led by their governments who "give" their people "Privileges".

Those countries should be listed as Socialist Democracies and or partially free. Not free.

The Only country that should be listed as free and a democratic republic should be the United States ... Even though it is far from what the founders of this country intended. Contributed by Richard Taylor APP, American Patriot Party.

You are free to create your own methodology and ranking and publish it. This article only reports what Freedom House has found in their research. Reserch that has in turn been used by many other researchers.Ultramarine 15:22, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Rofl. Seems like a joke. Jetro 18:25, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

A joke indeed

Editing this page

While understanding that any page on Wikipedia can be edited, I don't really see a need for any serious editing of this page. It isn't really up for discussion, as it is a published list. Formatting is one thing, but any content editing is more or less going to be vandalism.--Thomas.macmillan 04:34, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Some formatting should be done, the table is not at all in the common format in Wikipedia: it's not sortable, the colors make it quite unreadable, and why split it into regions? AtikuX 03:49, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Turkey

Hi there you all! I took Turkey back to where it belongs! From Western Europe to Middle East!

Please don't change it back all you fans of Turkey just because you like it! The country isn't in Europe.

• No one changed Turkey to western Europe. It was listed as such, however misguided, by the people who made up the list and as such should continue to be listed as western Europe.--Thomas.macmillan 15:08, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Edit: Oh, now i understand. Ok. For a moment I thought, that wikipedians themselves are messing around with Turkey, but ok. I'll fix it myself. Sorry.

I'm not really sure why either of you seem to classify Turkey as the Middle East. While it does share some cultural characteristics with the Middle East, it shares just as many with Western Europe. It is also geographically classified as European, just as Kazakhstan is. Do a little research before you start labeling efforts as "misguided". --Cathenryinc 20:36 5 September 2006

I have done plenty of research. It is an opinion and this is a talk page, not an actual article. Personally, I classify Turkey as more Middle Eastern than western European because of a)geography and b)hundreds of years of cultural history. I think you can classify Turkey, more correctly, as eastern Europe and Middle Eastern. But this is not relevant to the article because Turkey was classified as western Europe by the Freedom House, not me or anyone else on Wikipedia.--Thomas.macmillan 03:56, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

• Nations ought to be classified in this list the way that the report classifies them. In this case, the list only classifies them by Sovereign, Related and Disputed. It has groupings for the purpose of comparing numbers of "free", "partly free" and "not free" states, but does not list which states are in which groups. If it does, then it should be grouped that way, and not any other way. --Kitch 20:43, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

The UN classifies Turkey as Eastern Asian: it should be put back where it belongs... http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/08/United_Nations_geographical_subregions.png

• Regardless of how the UN classifies it, Freedom House classifies it as part of Europe when it groups things by region because they are EU candidates. http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=272&year=2006 If we wish the Wikipedia entry to reflect Freedom House's report, it should be left in Europe.

-- 63.138.81.98 21:56, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Turkey is by no means in Western Europe. It is further from countries like Britain and France than new countries that were originally Russia, which are considered Eastern Europe.

This is not relevant to the article because Turkey was classified as western Europe by the Freedom House, not me or anyone else on Wikipedia. Randam (talk) 22:10, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Turkey is actually not free.--Aitor Ayala (talk) 17:22, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Changes since 2005

The Freedom in the World 2006 report also shows changes since last year. Shouldn't such changes be noted here, and shouldn't it be mentioned which nations were upgraded and which ones were downgraded?

According to the report, Indonesia and Trinidad and Tobago were upgraded from Partly Free to Free.

Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon and Mauritania were upgraded from Not Free to Partly Free.

Guyana, The Philippines and Thailand were downgraded from Free to Partly Free.

Only Nepal was downgraded from Partly Free to Not Free. --Kitch 20:43, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

I quite agree. Maybe an "up" or "down" field should be added to the list? Nach0king 12:18, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Geographical Mistakes

Hey there, Germany is Central Europe, not western Europe. And there'd be necessary a category "Southern Europe", being the common term for countries like Italy, Greece, Turkey, Malta, ...

Western Europe is considered to be only those countries in the west of Germany. And there's Northern Europe with the skandinavian countries. Maybe the best solution would be only "Europe" with no further distinctions, as it's the case with "Americas". My german keyboard layout is broken, so unfortunately i can't sign this comment.

As noted previously for Turkey, the country areas are the choice of the freedom house who compiles the list, not Wikipedia.

Here I think the distinction is between those countries in NATO / on the side of America in the Cold War and those who, well weren't. To be honest I don't think this list is appropriate for Wikipedia as it reflects the opinions of a single group, who seem to have an agenda, but for now it is inappropriate to move or reformulate country groupings. --Neo 18:18, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Turkey lies in the Middle East and is an authoritarian pseudo-secular Islamic ideological state.--Aitor Ayala (talk) 17:25, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Freedom House and Freedom

I think that the list currently seems to reflect the opinions of a single agency, and therefore wonder whether it can reasonably be called Th. That this is controversial can be seen in the disputes within the comments above.

The question though is what is an appropriate action for this - should the page be moved, for instance to Freedom House; Freedom in the World Index, or sent to AFD?

I'm *probably* in favour of the first option, but willing to change my opinion either way if convincing arguments are presented; however I would welcome input from other before proposing either action. --Neo 22:38, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

The article is not stating that this is the truth, it only describes the report. It does not violate NPOV more than the article about Das Capital. Both articles simply describe reports or books.Ultramarine 09:43, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

The problem is with the title, adding a "US-based" into the intro, will make the visitor research the controversial Freedom House, before taking the data for granted.--Gerash77 07:46, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Added a note to see the main article for a discussion of organization (and also it own view on the funding).Ultramarine 15:26, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

I am not sure what are you trying to say. Could you elaborate on your position before an edit war? --Gerash77 22:16, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

The article should be npov and also present the views of Freedom House regarding funding and that the report is widely used by reserachers. I think it would be better to discus that in the main article. If you insist, I will move all that material here.Ultramarine 22:21, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

I think more discussion is needed to find an appropriate title. The findings of a government agency can't be titled "Freedom in the World". I am sure there are other more independent researches that are worthy of this title. I'll put an appropriate tag on it, in hope of finding a consensus on this.--Gerash77 22:16, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

The former title was Freedom in the World 2006 which is the title of the report. We can change it back to that.Ultramarine 22:19, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Taiwan

The 2005 map has Taiwan as "free," whereas the 2006 map gives it a Level 7 for political freedom and a Level 6 for civil liberties -- i.e., just as unfree as China. This is extremely misleading, since Taiwan's level of freedom did not change significantly between 2005 and 2006. It looks like the 2005 map is treating Taiwan as an independent country, while the 2006 map treats it as part of China. Shouldn't the maps be consistent? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 218.170.133.115 (talk) 15:07, 17 January 2007 (UTC).

Note that all maps refer to the same report, the 2006 report which deals with the year 2005. But yes, seems to be mistakes regarding taiwan. You can try to contact the creator of the map or download it yourself, correct it, and upload it back.Ultramarine 18:45, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

the reason taiwan is listed as free is because it takes orders from and cooperates with the united states. it also buys weapons from the u.s. and im sure it gets a few extra points for this. dont be so naive. this list is not based on actual freedom, but on cooperation with the usa, and nato. guess who makes this list? the united states. singapore is listed as partly free and this was a place where you couldnt even chew bubble gum. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 987979d87897897 (talk • contribs) 06:26, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Italy and Venezuela

I updated the status of Italy and Venezuela reflecting the lastest changes. Both got dowgraded - Italy from Free to Partially Free due to Berlusconi's extreme influence over most media and Venezuela from Partially Free to Not Free due to forced shut down of a major goverment-critial TV network. CharonX/talk 00:36, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Have you perhaps mixed up the Freedom House "Freedom of the Press" report with their "Freedom in the World" series, which is the subject of this article? Checking their website, Venezuela is indeed show "Not Free" in the "Freedom of the Press" study, but this is not the same as the "Partly Free" rating it is given in the most recent "Freedom in the World", which is what is being listed here. The first would be looking at press freedom specifically, the second at the country overall. I'll revert your change - if I'm mistaken let me know. - David Oberst 00:57, 30 May 2007 (UTC) You are not mistaken.

Oops, you are right. I had gotten the pages mixed up (lesson learned: don't edit Wikipedia when you are tired) CharonX/talk 11:09, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Previous indexes

It would be much better if this page presented more than just this year's ratings. Dynamics is at least as important as current data. Colchicum 18:30, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

WOW! You guys really know geography!

I mean how can be Turkey, Greece, Italy, Malta, Finland, Cyprus, Norway, Sweden etc. placed in "Western Europe"? Please read some more western doesn't mean south, north or east...

No need to tell us that, explain it to the ones who did the report!That-Vela-Fella 21:02, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

It's not about geography my friend, it's about cultural and (maybe) political influence. Ok, i have to admit that Turkey may not be the best of examples, but "Greece, Italy, Malta, Finland, Cyprus, Norway, Sweden etc" as you put it all have their roots to Western civilisation, especially if you consider that the very foundation of this culture lies there. Particularly ancient Greece and the Romans.

Anyway this is the view of the Freedom House. Maybe we should introduce a "Criticism" section in order to provide alternatives and voice issues like this. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.32.166.111 (talk) 20:36, August 25, 2007 (UTC)

Title change

Because the article is about the Freedom in the World report by Freedom House and not about freedom in the world itself, the title is wrong and misleading. The title should be "Freedom in the World Report by Freedom House", showing exactly what it is. A real Freedom in the World article must have lost of sources and be open for discussion and edit.--ClaudioMB 16:17, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

True - I would be happy for this to be changed. Pexise 18:29, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Why not "Freedom in the World Report"? 68.49.245.207 15:45, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

The source of any report is more important than the report itself. If the report has more than one source, than you could take from the title.--ClaudioMB 16:52, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

If there is no more discussion the title will be changed in couple days.--ClaudioMB 00:39, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

This is the standard way to name books and reports in Wikipedia. We do not write "The Capital by Karl Marx", for example.Ultramarine 13:17, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

That is the standard way if the name does not conflict with an issue. Like Civilization article that is about human society, anything else with Civilization title must be differentiated, like the article Civilization (computer game). Also Collapse (book) instead of Collapse. Or Capital, where does not go directly to the Capital by Karl Marx. This case is even worse, because the report is about the issue, what could easily mislead people to believe that is an impartial article (because is Wikipedia) about freedom in the world, when it's one single point of view on the issue. A "Freedom in the World" article, where this report is used as one of many sources would be impartial. Here, a title like "Freedom in the World (report by Freedom House)" is suitable.--ClaudioMB 23:54, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Odd, it kinda makes sense to change it, but I don't see any other (disambiguation) for another similar topic on it. If there was then I'd fully agree to it.That-Vela-Fella 00:12, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

I know there isn't a similar article at this moment, but it does not change the fact the title is wrong. The article is not about freedom in the world, but about the "Freedom in the World" report by Freedom House.--ClaudioMB 05:21, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Understandably, but wouldn't the person seeing that read the 1st sentence of the article & realize it right away what it's all about? I highly doubt people are getting confused on it as the likes of other ones on here, like Das Kapital or Mein Kampf. I'd go so far as to agree with what was said before, just add in the word REPORT after it. That-Vela-Fella 06:10, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

More books by Marx: Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right, The Civil War in France, or The Communist Manifesto. All of these could be mistaken for something more general if going by the title alone and ignoring the capital letters. But Wikipedia does not add a "by Karl Marx" or "Book" after these article titles.Ultramarine 12:04, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

If there is any other article title that you feel could cause misunderstanding, you should argue in those articles to change their titles. It does not change the problem here.--ClaudioMB 22:51, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

You should argue where the naming conventions in Wikipedia are decided that these should be changed. Until then, this article should follow established practice.Ultramarine 22:53, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

(reseting indentation)
There isn't any convention in Wikipedia that is untouchable, Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy WP:BURO. Just read the first paragrapher on Wikipedia:Naming conventions (books) "... it is not set in stone and should be treated with common sense...". (after here, I will ask to include one more direction to how title a book or report article). Also, in Deciding to disambiguate "Ask yourself: When a reader enters this term in the Wikipedia search box and pushes "Go", what article would they most likely be expecting to view as a result?" . In this case, even though there isn't yet an article for freedom in the world, it is that what people expect to get when then enter that title. Not an article about a report from an organization. If it was a fictional book with that title, it would not be a problem because there is no chance for misunderstanding. But, because it is a report about the subject, then it becomes a misunderstanding since that subject cannot be based on one single source and be unchallengeable - no one could use another source to change any given mark on that article, because the article is about the report and no one could change the report but the source itself. In this way, freedom in the world would be defined by one organization. That's unacceptable. At least, the word report must be included.--ClaudioMB 00:15, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I think you underestimate people's ability to understand what they read. But how about "Freedom in the World (report)"?Ultramarine 07:40, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I know lost of people will read and understand that is a report from one organization, but also there are people that are going directly to the table and accept those marks as balanced and without bias (what's almost impossible since it comes from one single organization funded by one government). "Freedom in the World (report)" helps, even though I still prefer "Freedom in the World (report by Freedom House)" to show that's a one source report. Anyway, this open the title for an article about freedom in the world. Since this discussion has already 6 days and no one else opposes the change, I'll move the article to "Freedom in the World (report)".--ClaudioMB 15:55, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Awful blue

Why people changed the colouring of the map and the ratings from the red/red-brown to… blue? Come on, redish tones are almost an universal color to alert on concerning or bad situations, while blue or greens are used to indicate good situations. So, if the map is about the freedom (or the lack of) in the world, green or blue should be use to describe more freedom, and reddish tones used to indicate less freedom.

Why would a color really matter on it that much & who says it's "universally" seen that way for red? It was said before that it matches with the colors used on the Freedom House's website map, thus following convention on here also.

Changing sentence

I think this sentence is not clear enough: "The ratings in this table reflect findings based on global events from 1 December 2005 through 31 December 2006." Since the rating is define by Freedom House, it should be change to something like: "The ratings in this table are define by Freedom House, which says they reflect findings based on global events from 1 December 2005 through 31 December 2006.". How a rating is define is extremely important and should be very clear. The away is written now, sounds Freedom House does not define the rating but just collects from a source.--ClaudioMB 23:24, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

They do not define the ratings, they have methodology they follow when doing research which then gives the scores.Ultramarine 23:29, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Then, the methodology used should be explain (how works, who created and sources). The away is written now does not prove anything.--ClaudioMB 23:39, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

You can read it here.[3] But you are right, this should be expanded in this article, for some reason it is described in the Freedom House article. Will correct this in the coming days.Ultramarine 23:45, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Clarification

In this sentence "The ratings in this table reflect findings based on global events from 1 December 2005 through 31 December 2006. It is often used by researchers in order to measure democracy and correlates highly with several other measures of democracy like the Polity data series.[3]". What is it? The rating or the findings?--ClaudioMB 03:40, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

What's so confusing on it? The table is just like what's shown on the map & says the ratings reflect the findings. Thus it is referring to the findings, just like several other measures that are used to determine the democracy of places. At least that's what I understand it to mean. That-Vela-Fella 08:45, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. It makes sense, even though could be better written. I'll try do it. --ClaudioMB 22:54, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

NPOV

This article should explain the report. Could show the results of the report, but also should explain in a neutral point of view, by an expert on the subject, how that results were found. The way it is now, this article is just a propagation of the report, with only one point of view: the report's creator. So, I'm placing a npov tag until this be solved.--ClaudioMB 04:27, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. This is just one organizations claims. It doesn't matter whether it's factual or not, but rather one organizations beliefs. Which would translate into the United States beliefs, considering the government funds the program.

-G —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.117.158.83 (talk) 03:02, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

!! Freedom House employees infiltrated in this talk page...

Use WikiScanner (http://wikiscanner.virgil.gr/) and put "Freedom House" in the first box... Interestingly it will lead you back to this talk page, plus a handful more... All contributions made anonymously from IP address 63.138.81.98 are written by Freedom House employees... And the common point all these contributions have is that they try to convince us that Freedom House is an independent, unbiased, humanitarian, non-governmental organisation that works for the progress of humanity, while the truth is that it is a 95% US government-funded organisation that has been used as an instrument of propaganda since at least World War II. Schizophonix 10:43, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Please see my response on the talk page for the main Freedom House Article. I would not say "infiltrated". 63.138.81.98 17:42, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Not infiltrated, but doing controversial edits. See here--ClaudioMB 23:04, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I insist you were infiltrated in this page, because you never revealed your status as a FH employee and you were writing about FH in the third person ("they") instead of the first ("we"). This is called astroturfing and it seems to me as an attempt at deceiving the rest of the editors. Schizophonix 13:11, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Editing by an IP associated with Freedom House

Please be aware a Freedom House employee is participating in this talk page. User 63.138.81.98 is in fact a Feedom House employee, see discussion below for details. Pexise 12:09, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

This was at the top of the page. Since another editor (below) states that the IP's edits have been undone, there seems no point to have this warning at the top. (There is a template for making such alerts, which should be used instead of such messages, btw.)  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 02:51, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Warning at the top of this page

I believe that the warning on the top of the page regarding my participation on this talk page is inappropriate. The details of my affiliation with Freedom House has been discussed in detail on the talk page itself, and users who are concerned with that can read that discussion. I have made a good faith effort to follow the Suggestiong for COI compliance [[4]], and have explained my actions on this page. You will note that the recommended method for other editors to deal with COI does not include posting a message at the top of the talk page. I feel that in particular the language of this warning is inflammatory; the use of the word "infiltrated" implies bad faith on my part where none has been shown, and I do not believe that my comments bear out the statement that I have pushed a pro-FH point of view. I respectfully request that it be removed. Thank you. 63.138.81.98 17:27, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

That does seem pointless to mention it on the top & also a bit mean spirited for doing that. A topic has already been done with the issue on here (see #21) & having a warning serves no useful purpose anyways. I have thus taken it out & I'll leave it with an administrator if they feel there has to be some valid reason it should be put back. That-Vela-Fella 18:00, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Right - I've changed the language, but the comment should stay - the fact that you are a FH employee is very important and new editors could miss the discussion about this. Also, the fact that you were not honest about this in the first place and an editor needed to identify you using an esoteric piece of software makes this notice necessary. Pexise 12:08, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Pexise: WikiScanner is not an "esoteric piece of software" it is a tool that can be used freely by anyone to find if the IPs of anonymous editors are registered to "interested" organisations who use Wikpedia as a means of self promotion. I urge you to use it yourself (http://wikiscanner.virgil.gr/). Just remember a couple of things 1) Not all edits from interested editors are self-promotional 2) Interested editors can conceal their ID by registering or by editing from a neutral IP e.g. from home. Schizophonix 10:01, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Ah - very interesting, you're right, it is easy to use. Well done for spotting that 63.138.81.98 is from Freedom House. I guess my point was that if it wasn't for your initiative, we would still be none the wiser about his/her identity. Although the Wikiscanner is free to use, not everyone knows about it, and it requires some real detective work to find something out like the conflict of interest that was exposed here. Pexise 12:32, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree that that warn should stay. As Pexise said, new editors could easy miss the discussion about it and the employee showed not good faith when he/she fail to warn other editors of his/her conflict of interest. Also, it should be warn that this could happen again, if a FH employee uses a neutral IP. --ClaudioMB 16:26, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

What is the big issue here? This organization made this ranking, Wikipedia just basically copied it on its page. It seems accurate to me, besides there is nothing in this world which has no bias in it. (74.134.124.3 02:13, 14 October 2007 (UTC))

Taiwan

I noticed that Taiwan has switched back and forth between Taiwan and Republic of China a couple of times over the past few days. Right now it is listed as "Republic of China"... may I suggest that it is listed either as Taiwan (as that is how it is listed in the Freedom of the World report) or else has both names presented- i.e. Republic of China (Taiwan)? I feel like listing it just as "Republic of China" is confusing, as it is almost never referred to that way in common speech, and it is very similar to "People's Republic of China".... If that seems like a reasonable change, someone should make it, as I don't edit this page. Thanks! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.234.233.58 (talk) 20:26, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Personally I think it should be called Taiwan (but if others disagree then "Republic of China (Taiwan)" would also seem OK). After all, the purpose of this article (as far as I can tell) appears to be to reproduce Freedom House's rankings of countries. Freedom House's opinions are clearly non-neutral. Not everyone agrees with calling Taiwan/ROC "Taiwan" - but nor does everyone agree with the rankings that FH hands out. Why sanitize the naming, thus obscuring the bias of the rankings? 81.129.130.183 (talk) 23:56, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

If it makes sense you to, go ahead and change it... We've had the comment up for about a month, and no one has disagreed that it should be listed as Taiwan. I can't change it myself. Thanks! 63.138.81.98 (talk) 15:55, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

taiwan is used by those who want to separate taiwan and the prc. divide and conquer is the goal. theyre probably the same guys who are supporting the tibetan separatist movement. the people who prefer roc, are people who want a strong and unified china. these can be chinese people themselves, or maybe people being bullied by the west. the list is too long to list. most western sources will prefer a divided china because that means that the west can take more control over the world. its that simple.

Why is "not free" blue?

I thought it would be red or something. I don't know where the CSS is, so could someone change this, if it's needed? ZtObOr 02:46, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Not Free is blue because Freedom House uses that (well, actually, purple) instead of red on their map. Since this is a reproduction of Freedom House's map, it makes sense to not use red. 63.138.81.98 (talk) 21:33, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

It had also been mentioned above under awful blue. That-Vela-Fella (talk) 01:46, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

The bright blue in the map annoys me as well. In the Freedom house map, "not free countries" are coloured in a "dirty blue", not in the bright blue used in the map. Maybe someone could change it, thus making the map both more "intuitive" and closer to the original map?--Roentgenium111 (talk) 23:09, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Freedom in the World Release Schedule

There seems to be some confusion about when Freedom House releases its rankings and reports for Freedom in the World. (Note change that says that full reports are not released until one year later for free). So I figured I would clear it up a bit.

In early January, Freedom House releases the scores. They are titled with the current year (in this case, 2008), but cover events from January through December of the previous year (so in this case, Jan 2007-Dec 2007). Because it requires a good deal more copy-editing and layout work to prepare hundreds of pages of reports for release than the score list does, the reports typically come out in late spring or early summer. As soon as they are ready, they are posted, free for everyone to view, on the Freedom House website. The printed version of the book, avalible for purchase, usually comes out a few weeks later, as it takes more time to print a book than upload website content.

I think the most accurate way to phrase this paragraph would be "Detailed descriptions of all nations from the previous year's edition can be found online in Freedom in the World 2007. Please note that while the rankings below are from the current year's edition of Freedom in the World, detailed reports for 2008 will not be avalible online until late spring/early summer." Once the reports come out, this can be revised.

Thanks! 76.111.114.169 (talk) 02:44, 15 February 2008 (UTC) ← Is above mentioned Freedom House employee posting from out of the office.

Map mistake.

I would like to point out that Pakistan is shown as a "Not-free" country on the top map at the top right hand corner of the article. This needs to be corrected to "Partly-free" in order to reflect the results of the report. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cheese1125 (talk • contribs) 00:00, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

That's because the map shows the 2008 report. It needs to be updated.--Roentgenium111 (talk) 13:37, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Australia etc

Australia is de facto a colony and people living in Australia never get a chance to elect their head of state. How is it possible then that it is a free country??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.82.92.134 (talk) 08:27, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

What year are you referring to? It hasn't been a penal colony for over a century now! Do you even have any legit source to back your claim? That-Vela-Fella (talk) 21:52, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

I believe the anon user means Queen Elizabeth, who's still Australia's head of state, and still appoints a governor with some actual powers. okedem (talk) 09:29, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

the reason australia is considered free is because it is under the control of the u.s, allows the u.s to dock its naval ships. britain actually doesnt have much say in what goes on in aus, however, the u.s. does, and you can see this by how the u.s. ousted kevin rudd, and replaced him with a more pro u.s. pm. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 987979d87897897 (talk • contribs) 06:31, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

in Australia we cannot even go live by ourselves in a remote area without being forced to vote forced to pay tax forced to have a postal address even if did no harm or even existed in most peoples minds. Yet you call Australia free? We are prisoners of the Australian Government. 27.32.141.11 (talk) 17:23, 24 November 2014 (UTC)

Proposal for Removing this report from Wikipedia

Why isn't the external link on the Freedom House Wikipedia page to the report on the Freedom House web site good enough? Is it really standard practice on wikipedia to copy reports from web sites and post their contents on wikipedia?

Anyone doing the slightest research on Freedom House knows that it gets about 66% of its funding from the U.S. government and has been accused by men like Noam Chomsky of being a propaganda arm of the U.S. government. The United States has 25% of the world's prison population and only 5% of the world's total population yet it has gotten perfect scores by Freedom House every single year.

Posting this report on wikipedia is essentially like posting a press release by the White House or Congress on wikipedia.

I vote for the removal of this article. 24.250.10.227 (talk) 08:18, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

People are imprisoned in the US after convictions for crimes. Freedom House does not recognize drug offenders, thieves, and sex offenders "political prisoners". Neither does Freedom House measure freedom from economic distress. One can say all sorts of scurrilous things about the President and find no unpleasant consequences. Pbrower2a (talk) 22:12, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

The report is not reprinted, a summary of its conclusions are. Freedom House publishes an annual article per country, arguing why they place each country in the bracket they do. Wikipedia is not censored so it doesn't delete articles simply because someone doesn't like the topic described by an article. Even if the rest of your comment is true (for which you have presented no sources at all, so your statement is unverifiable), Freedom House is an internationally well-known organization and its annual reports are reported by media around the world. If you wish to see other organizations' view on the state of the world's nations, List_of_indices_of_freedom is the list you're looking for. 80.167.179.233 (talk) 12:19, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Did you not read Wikipedia's own article on Freedom House? That is where I got the funding numbers and the claims of Freedom House being a propaganda arm of the U.S. government. My contention is that the whole article is NPOV which if others agreed would override Wikipedia is not censored. Are you honestly telling me that if Cuba or North korea put out a Feeedom in the World report every year its conclusions would be contained in its own Wikipedia article? I don't think so. 24.250.10.227 (talk) 16:45, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Color Error on Bottom Chart

On the chart plotting freedom over time, the colors are reversed from the map key, making comprehension of the trends very difficult. gnfnrf (talk) 14:14, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

New report for 2011

This is no longer the most current report, a new report was released January 13, 2011[5] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.96.217.172 (talk) 17:22, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Criteria

I guess the criteria could be summarized as "The freedom of a country is directly proportional to the likelihood of a group within that country taking power that is extremely friendly to the US". Yeah, I know this is not a forum, but, seeing as I got to this article via the Libyan protests' article, I believe that Wikipedians seem to be giving too much importance o validity to this arbitrary Organization. Why should it even be referenced in such articles as if it was an "authority on freedom studies"? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.181.30.76 (talk) 20:58, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Then why are Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Jordan, Egypt, and Israeli-occupied territories all ranked as not-free and Venezuela and Colombia ranke the same? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.96.217.172 (talk) 22:14, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

As an illustration, at the beginning of 2011 Egypt was clearly "not free". Political rights were effectively a travesty because political competition with the ruling National Democratic Party was impossible. The President of Egypt was effectively a dictator. Media were either controlled or censored. Dissent with the government was limited to what the government considered "safe".

Egypt may not have been as bad as Libya or North Korea in denying political rights and civil liberties, but in effect the Egyptian people had no say about the content or behavior of "their" government. That may have changed, but that will appear as the case, if at all, in the 2012 edition.Pbrower2a (talk) 22:20, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a blog or a soap-box. You need to restrict your comments on article talk pages to suggestions for improving the articles using reliable sources and neutral language.

 Kiefer.Wolfowitz 23:33, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Many things wrong w/ this thing

First, the israeli territories have an isreal flag, it should have a palestinian flag also, it SHOULD be palestine! Not isreali territories! This report IS biased, its ranked based on friendliness to the USA. I agree w/ the person that said this was ran by us government officails. AND it should NOT be based on democracy. Saudi Arabia is one of the most free and rich countries in the WORLD!!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.121.205.118 (talk) 21:57, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Single source: Reliability

The criticism section Giannone, a problem of single sourcing.

Reliability

Giannone's article seems to misrepresent Kenneth A. Bollen's reports. Bollen, in several writings, has reported on previous studies of human-rights indices, sometimes discussing Freedom House. Bollen quotes criticisms by Edward S. Hermann (a coauthor of Chomsky, btw). These previous authors' criticisms are attributed to Bollen by Giannone.

What is worse, Giannone failed to report any positive or neutral findings that also were reported by Bollen, even though some of them were reported directly after the negative statements. Such partisan cherry-picking and misrepresentation seems to make Giannone an unreliable source for the methodological criticisms. (Such criticisms are only a small section of Giannone's paper, which also has a Gramscian discussion of ideology, etc.)  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 18:06, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Sincerely,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 01:04, 4 August 2011 (UTC) 18:06, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I assume that this topic is the reason for the NPOV-section template on the "Ideological bias or neutrality" section. Is that correct? Have the recent changes addressed this issue? If this is still a concern, how do we go about addressing it? Jeff Ogden (talk) 16:15, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

This section is still built around Giannone's article, whose character is shown by its statement of methodology (look what he assumes). I would favor removing Giannone as an unreliable and fringe source. I would favor writing an honest section using serious scholars who are not cherry picking negative statements about FH to support their assumptions.

The articles cited by Giannone seem to be biased towards anti-American and leftwing sources, and some of them seem to be low quality (working papers, non-academic books published by Marxist or very leftwing socialist publishing houses, etc.).

I assume that Bollen somewhere has written a popular account of such indices: Each aggregates a lot of measurements/statistics, which differ according to the sources, and measurements of freedom disagree. However, they disagree rather slightly, according to Mainwaring's study.

Because of our ethical code and traditions, statisticians have to be careful when we write. I think Bollen was very careful with what he wrote, based on my quick reading.

Przeworski in an interview made a crack about Freedom House's being biased; if he would state something substantial in an article or paper that would be a high quality and usually very reliable (but always interesting) source, which could be discussed. Przeworski used to identify himself as a socialist but now he may call himself a leftwing social-democrat or pragmatist.

Mainwaring, being a Latin Americanist critical of FH, probably is roughly the same politically, btw. (I worked with a human-rights political scientist and NGO director who noted him as an up-and-coming star 3 years out of grad school, btw, so it was pleasant for me to read this article.)

Has Amartya K. Sen written about FH?

(To me it's interesting that the (anti-anti-leftwing) indices agree so strongly with FH's index.)

Bollen would probably be a rather mainstream view, and have good references. Przeworski and Sen would be careful with their references also. These three, especially Bollen, could be trusted with understanding and applying statistical methods competently.

If we looked at these three, I would not object to a removal of the NPOV tag, especially if we checked what one or more of these three would regard as a conservative source.

I believe that there are also articles written by conservatives, libertarians, centrist liberals, right-wing social democrats, also. I think somebody should at least look for a highly regarded scholar often viewed as more "rightwing", and see if there is anything important that should be added. Then I would remove the NPOV tag.

 Kiefer.Wolfowitz 19:42, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

NPOV: Giannone v. Bollen

I removed this section, which I think quotes dubious assertions from a fringe unreliable source:

BEGIN QUOTE: In his article "Political and ideological aspects in the measurement of democracy: the Freedom House case", Diego Giannone made many criticisms of Gastil's methods and of Freedom House, using ideas of Gramsci and Wallerstein:

"In accordance with the theoretical positions expressed at different times by Gramsci and Wallerstein about the function of scientific knowledge, we assume that FH [Freedom House's] measuring instruments have come to be part of those structures of knowledge that are an essential element in the functioning and legitimacy of political, economic, and social structures of the existing world-system. In fact, they (also) provide a scientific justification for the distribution of power and the legitimacy of the status quo, hinging on the twofold characteristic of their vast and ‘necessary’ use and their alleged neutrality. Thus the development of these instruments is fully linked to the battle for 'the creation of a hegemonic apparatus, because it creates a new ideological terrain, leads to a reform of consciousness and methods of knowledge’.

One can consider measuring instruments as genuine methods for understanding social reality; however, they are not politically and ideologically neutral. Therefore, to the extent that they are not neutral, they can be used as tools for acquiring and/or strengthening such a hegemony." (Giannone, p. 70; emphasis in original)

Giannone criticized "ideological biases" in Gastil's methodology, which he says have been noted by several sources and countered by at least one.

Giannone asserted "a perfect coincidence between FH changes and the strategies of US foreign policy implemented in 1990s, and above all after 11 September 2001 by the Bush administration, to spread freedom and export democracy", with "Freedom ... defined almost always in a negative way, with particular reference to the role of the state, accused of undue intervention, indoctrination, and even equated with criminal organizations as obstacle to private economic activity".

END QUOTE:

The problem is that this source doesn't lay out evidence for this conclusion, which would require at least a time series of changes in methodology and changes in the Bush administration policy. "perfect coincidence" is particularly dubious. From Giannone's methodological statement, which assumes similar claims, maybe he doesn't feel there is a need to present evidence?

Presently, the article only quotes criticism from Herman (a collaborator with Chomsky) and ignores any positive evaluations also quoted by Bollen, following Giannone. It quotes and uses results from the critical article by Mainwaring et alia (which is cited and quoted by Giannone). This makes me think that it has POV problems still.

However, with this material from Giannone gone, and the previous misrepresentations by Giannone corrected and the original source properly quoted or summarized, the NPOV problems are tolerable and I shall remove the NPOV tag.

If somebody restores this Giannone material, please restore it at the end, perhaps in a sub-sub section which should have a NPOV tag.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 22:53, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for doing all of this work and for explaining what you did and why. It would be wonderful of more editors did this more often. Jeff Ogden (talk) 18:33, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Contested deletion

This page should not be speedy deleted because it's only a part that is a possible infringement, not the whole article, and that possible infringement is highly dubious. --OpenFuture (talk) 09:42, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree with OpenFuture. Jeff Ogden (talk) 10:32, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

The template is only on part of the article. Only that part would be affected. Best regards,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 10:48, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Responding to your objections, I have replaced the speedy deletion tag with more deliberate copyright violation concern tag.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 11:40, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I guess the new template is a little better, but now the original content has been removed/blanked and all that is left is a long quote from the article whose copyright is aledged to have been violated. I am not at all sure that the original text was a copyright violation, but the long quote seems more likely to be a violation. Jeff Ogden (talk) 12:28, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Jeff, please look at the template. There are instructions for accessing the history of the article, with the alleged copyvio problems, given there.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 18:24, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

If we were to vote, I'd vote that the original text was not a copyright violation. In any case, if there is a copyright violation here, the solution isn't to simply delete pretty much the entire criticism section. There needs to be some sort of criticism section to address the concerns that have been expressed repeatedly on this talk page. If there is a copyright issue here, someone is going to have to rewrite something. I don't think the content should be deleted until we have a replacement. This is not new content. I don't think there is a particular hurry on this. We have time to do the job right. Jeff Ogden (talk) 12:28, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Have you compared the articles? That's nearly a page whose content has been quoted. It needs to disappear until somebody reads some more and writes some coherent text.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 12:49, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I did not see that. The text which you quoted is not what was there before. I'm still unsure on what you mean has been copied, so you need to be more specific if you want to convince me. But then again, convincing me is probably not very useful, I'm not involved in the copyright checks on Wikipedia, so I don't really count. :-) --OpenFuture (talk) 13:20, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I quoted from the article itself, so you can compare. Just open up a text editor. In one new file, past the article by Giannone. In another, paste the WP article before i touched it. Then compare them. Is there anything in our article that wasn't in the original? (CLARIFICATION: 18:23, 4 August 2011 (UTC) A secondary problem is that our references to other scholarship seem to be based on unwarranted Good-faith assumptions about the source, because they are just copied, even when the cited reference says something completely different. Please consider this second issue later.)  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 14:18, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I asked you to be specific, you give me a lesson in making diffs. This is not constructive. --OpenFuture (talk) 15:04, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Please read the template, which contains instructions for accessing the article.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 18:26, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

And I'm confused by Wolfowitz's last reply. Are we dealing with an alleged copyright violation here or are we dealing with possible misleading information in the section that isn't supported by the references cited? Those are two very different things with different approaches to investigation and possible solutions. It is important to keep the issues separate and to be clear which issues we are dealing with in our discussions on this talk page. If there is in fact more than one issue to be dealt with here, it would be good to start a new section for the discussion of each issue. This section started out as a discussion of possible deletion due to an alleged copyright violation and I think it should continue to focus on that topic. Jeff Ogden (talk) 16:17, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I am concerned that there may be a copyright violation or a violation of related policies on plagiarism or extensive paraphrasing .... I am powerless to diagnose the exact ailment of the patient, which I discovered yesterday, and so I called on a higher power. There is a problem.

This problem is the cutting and pasting (with quotes) but with imperfect attribution of the extent of the borrowing. The references cited are reproduced apparently identically from the references in the Giannone's article, page 69. this is about a page of text imported without the sweat and rewriting and reorganization required to allow WP usage.

A secondary problem is that the Giannone's article misuses its sources. This is clear for Bollen, whose work was known to me. I am stating that Giannone's article is not a reliable source. We should deal with the RS issue later, if anything is left after the copyright cleanup.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 18:20, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Please review the simple comparison of the WP article and the Gionnone's article on the article page.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 12:39, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

• The content has been revised. More notes are available at the closed CP listing, Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2011 August 4. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 15:30, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks~, Moonriddengirl!  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 17:15, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I too would like to thank Moonriddengirl. Jeff Ogden (talk) 16:00, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Herman v. Przeworski: Quality and reliability

I added Przeworski, who is a world leading researcher publishing in a high quality reliable source, as a critic.

I removed this paragraph, which arose from a good-faith summary of a low quality unreliable article, which misrepresented Bollen:

While Bollen surveyed many reviews of Freedom of the World, including positive reviews, this Wikipedia article will quote only two negative reviews, which were quoted by Bollen (1986, p. 585) along with neutral or positive reviews. Bollen noted that Scobel et al. raised the concern that "a conservative bias may enter Gastil's judgements" because it was sponsored by Freedom House; a charge of "Cold War and pro-market biases" was made by Edward S. Herman and Broadhead. Bollen also quoted positive reviews, which are ignored here.

The Scobel et alia paper is hard to review even at a university library and Ed Herman's research is not world-leading in this area, unlike Przeworski.

Like my edit with Mainwaring et alia, I have tried to find the best research that that should go into this article. I restate that our article previously had been based on only one source, an extremely left-wing ideological article that cherry-picked quotations from other scholars and mis-attributed some quotes.I have merely replaced low-quality resources with high quality resources and better represented the scholars previously cited. Thus, I don't believe that this edit may be credibly charged with bias.

So far, I have not tried to correct what seems to me to be a POV towards leftwing critics. There is no mention of right-wing critics or centrist appraisals.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 21:47, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Freedom 2012

Freedom report for 2012 has now been released, could someone add in the new information please. --ERAGON (talk) 13:27, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

 Done, images need to be updated though. Mushroom (Talk) 09:08, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Lebanon

How is lebanon not an elctoral democratie? Philoleb (talk) 23:05, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

If Wikipedia has misreported FitW's classification of Lebanon (or another country), then please alert us with a clear statement, and somebody should fix the error.

If you find a reliable source that discusses Lebanon's classification, then please share that with us.

Thanks,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 23:29, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

I just checked both the 2012 and 2013 editions of Freedom in the World and Lebanon is not classified as an electoral democracy in either year in the list that appears on page 16 of the booklet (2012) (2013) or in the country profile for Lebanon (2012) (2013). So, I think the Wikipedia article is reporting Freedom House's findings correctly. Someone would need to contact Freedom House directly to check if the status is correct in their reports or find a reliable source that says that there is a mistake in the reports from Freedom House. --Jeff Ogden (W163) (talk) 03:56, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

Trend chart uses opposite color scheme, why?

Why does the chart under 'Trends' use the color scheme that is the exact opposite of the rest of the article -- here blue means free? Is there a special reason for this? 00:52, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I suspect that the answer is historical accident. The trend chart is a couple of years out-of-date. The next time someone updates it, it would be good to change the colors to march. It would be good to switch from a PNG image to SVG too. -Jeff Ogden (W163) (talk) 01:26, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

 Done. This got addressed by someone (not me) in April 2013. --Jeff Ogden (W163) (talk) 23:45, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Status of Turkey?

I am wondering as to why Turkey is included in the 'Western Europe' section when it clearly belongs in the 'Central and Eastern Europe/Eurasia' section? Can this not be remedied? 178.193.178.203 (talk) 00:47, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

That's because for some reason Freedom House prefers to put Turkey in Western Europe (see here). I can see your point, but the article has to follow their categorization. Mushroom (Talk) 00:57, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Freedom House's categorization dates from the Cold War. "Western Europe" = NATO and neutrals [Switzerland, Austria, Sweden and Finland], "Eastern Europe" = Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries. Even though the Cold War is over, Freedom House continues to group Turkey under the "Western Europe" header. Which is also the reason why Freedom House describes Western Europe as 85 % "Free" countries.[6] Turkey drags the score down. Valentinian ^{T / C} 21:45, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

Should we mention the odd classification?

As others have pointed out, the geographical classification by the Freedom House is odd in the extreme. For some reason, Turkey and Greece end up in Western Europe while countries such as Slovenia that in every sense (geographically, culturally, historically, politically, economically) are more "Western European" are not included.

Much more controversial, and equally odd, is the classification of disputed territories. To take but four examples, Israel, Kosovo, Northern Cyprus and Palestine, the treatment by Freedom House seems highly illogical. None of these four are universally recognized, yet two (Israel and Kosovo) are classified among all the universally recognized states, while two others are classified as "disputed territories". Israel is recognized by the largest number of states, followed by Palestine, then Kosovo and last Northern Cyprus. Israel, Kosovo and Northern Cyprus all control their own territory, Palestine doesn't. However, I do not find the logic by which Israel and Kosovo are "normal states" and Palestine and Northern Cyprus are disputed. All four are in some ways disputed, all four are recognized by at least some other state but none of the four is recognized by all other states. While the geographical classification is only a bit odd, this classification of states and disputed territories seems to suggest a rather heavy bias. Unless there is a logic that I'm missing, there might well be.

I agree that we should follow the categorization that Freedom House uses, but when a classification is this odd, it's usually commented upon in the text of the article.Jeppiz (talk) 11:46, 22 August 2012 (UTC)

See my reply above. Assigning Turkey and Greece to Western Europe dates from the Cold War era, when this publication started. Think of the Cold War's fault line between NATO and the Warsaw Pact, and the categorization makes perfect sence. In effect, the only territory that has ever changed place in Freedom House's categorization is the territory formerly belonging to East Germany (the GDR / DDR) since it is no longer a separate nation, but now part of the Federal Republic of Germany, which has always been grouped as "Western Europe". But it would be very nice if people would stop randomly messing around with the categories and deleting references to *why* Freedom House acts like it does. Valentinian ^{T / C} 21:54, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

Cold war has ended a quarter of a century ago. Do they really still use this odd classification? Hard to believe. Reilinger (talk) 13:40, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Well, it's not that hard to believe, provided that one uses a few seconds to check with the webpage.

http://www.freedomhouse.org/regions/western-europe

http://www.freedomhouse.org/regions/central-and-eastern-europeeurasia

Click the buttons called "select a country" and it'll show you a list of the countries in the relevant category, or click the "Countries & Topics" button on either page, and you'll get a map of the relevant geographical region. Since one of Freedom House's goals is to track the relative development of freedom and democracy in various regions, it would be rather counterproductive to change the categorization, since that would destroy the possibility of making long-term comparisons, and the "Eastern European" [Warsaw Pact] category has seen a colossal change during that period, primarily for the countries currently members of the EU. But the current diversity in that region is rather amazing, e.g. the different paths taken by the Baltic States and Central Asia after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Valentinian ^{T / C} 01:04, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

In order to comment on the odd geographic categorization wouldn't we need to find a reliable source that says that the categorization is odd? My suggestion is to stop summarizing the results in five separate tables by region and instead use a single sortable table that includes a new column for region. That would at least de-emphasize the regions. --Jeff Ogden (W163) (talk) 04:09, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

Main map

I've changed the current first map to accurately show what it now depicts (an updated freedom in the world 2013, not 2011) but I can't figure out how to change the name and description of the map file itself, or even if that's possible - it still says for the file itself.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2011_Freedom_House_world_map.svg#filelinks

Can someone who knows how to do this please?

Nwrnr (talk) 17:15, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

 Done. It looks like this got taken care of (not by me) some time ago. At least the name of the image file is now: File:2013 Freedom House world map.svg. --Jeff Ogden (W163) (talk) 23:56, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Nicaragua is an Electoral Democracy

This is a remark on the Countries designated "electoral democracies" in Freedom House's Freedom in the World 2013 survey image at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Electoral_democracies.png The talk page guidelines on that image say "try the talk page of an article that the image is used in" to request corrections to that image. Freedom House lists Nicaragua as an Electoral Democracy at http://www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2013/nicaragua Nicaragua is not labeled an Electoral Democracy in the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Electoral_democracies.png file. Eharding (talk) 00:44, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

In the "Political Rights and Civil Liberties" section in the 2013 country profile for Nicaragua that is part of the Freedom in the World 2013 report it says "Nicaragua is an electoral democracy". But on page 17 of the Freedom in the World 2013 booklet Nicaragua does not have the asterisk (*) that "indicates a country’s status as an electoral democracy". It is unclear to me which one is correct. Does anyone know how to sort this out? --Jeff Ogden (W163) (talk) 03:35, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

Nicaragua has an aggregate score of 19 in political rights so it is not an electoral democracy. Have a look on the Excel sheet they posted on their downloads page. Jackninja5 (talk) 05:54, 26 January 2016 (UTC)

Jammu and Kashmir

The map in the article which shows country ratings from Freedom House's Freedom in the World 2013 survey depicts Pakistan administrated Kashmir as part of Pakistan while it shows the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir as a separate country and that to with a wrong border, separating the state from rest of India by a horizontal straight line. Kindly correct the map by coloring the Indian administrated Kashmir with the same color as that of rest of India. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wiki.Gunjan (talk • contribs) 03:55, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Countries map needs an update to 2014

The map image is from 2013. Can someone update it, please? Faltur (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 04:56, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Eastern/Western Europe

Freedom House no longer uses Eastern and Western Europe for its classifications, it now uses just Europe and Eurasia, this should be updated. Abrahamic Faiths (talk) 17:13, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Country Rankings

Although the article provides detailed criteria for "electoral democracies," I would have appreciated the definition and criteria used for the primary ranking categories associated with "PR- Political Rights" and "CL - Civil Liberties." Criteria for each category value from 1 to 7 would also be prudent. SquashEngineer (talk) 15:07, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Actually, I think I might be able to do that. Hold on. Jackninja5 (talk) 02:44, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Lithuania is an electoral democracy

The map of electoral democracies does not show Lithuania, which is classed as "Free" by these criteria. It should be coloured blue as an electoral democracy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.24.185.202 (talk) 18:24, 22 December 2016 (UTC)

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Electoral democracies 2017

The electoral democracies map needs to be updated for 2017. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.24.185.202 (talk) 13:35, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

It still needs to be updated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.38.210.183 (talk) 13:31, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

It STILL needs to be updated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.38.210.183 (talk) 21:18, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

Remove a year or two

At this rate, the table rating every country for every year will get cluttered and hard to read. Maybe we should remove the oldest years and only have rankings for four or five of the most recent years? ProjectHorizons (talk) 03:21, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

this content

Newyorkbrad, I found you in the history, so I stopped before I did what I wanted to do: cut all of this, and leave what can be called an article about the publication, rather than a reiteration with sortable tables and maps of what's in the publication. I honestly don't agree with this content. Drmies (talk) 01:23, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

{{ping|Drmies} My involvement in editing this article has been tangential, so please don't worry about me as you edit it. However, lots of work went into those tables, so I suggest you might want to ping the editors who have added and updated them, instead. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:54, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

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Alphabetization in lists

I couldn't help but notice that the lists are sort of sorted in alphabetical order, but not entirely, and there are many weird exceptions. Is there a reason for this, like being auto-generated? (if not I will fix this). —Ynhockey ^(Talk) 08:50, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

@Ynhockey: I merged six regional tables and sorted the whole wikitext (which contains Flag template names) alphabetically. So I sorted the table by Flag template names not actual country names. The table should be corrected manually.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 09:43, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

I re-sorted programatically. It was reckless to sort the table by Flag template names.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 21:11, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

why not in alphabetic order?

Why are Saint Lucia and North Korea out of order?--Kintetsubuffalo (talk) 08:48, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

@Kintetsubuffalo: Fixed. See above section.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 09:19, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

Puerto Rico's 2017 Report

Can anyone find a verifiable source for a 2017 report for Puerto Rico? The latest report I can find https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2016/puerto-rico is 2016. --HighFlyingFish (talk) 21:11, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Hearing no response I'm going to be bold and remove the uncited content. If you have a source confirming that they reported on Puerto Rico in 2017 feel free to add it back cited. --HighFlyingFish (talk) 01:24, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Do we really need to have every year from 2009 listed?

The main list is getting incredibly crowded, which makes me wonder, why are we extending the chart even further back? why cant we maybe mention 2010 and 2015, but leave all the years between them out, focusing instead more on the most recent reports? 70.59.225.236 (talk) 23:57, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, that list looks incredibly cluttered. It just says 2018 and 2019 there now, but 2019 has tonnes of different columns showing different results with the same name...? I don't get it. –Jetro (talk) 01:36, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

“Related” and “disputed” territories

What is “related”? Related to what and how?—I presume to the sovereign state in parentheses, but what the symbol † adds is quite unclear. Is this language from the cited sources? I just added eastern Donbas, and it is not related to Ukraine but part of it (it comprises two separatist republics, but every recognized UN state recognize this territory as part of Ukraine), nor is it disputed like Crimea (no other state claims it). This categorization is confusing, and appears to represent a false dichotomy of classifying what Freedom in the World seems to refer to simply as “a territory as opposed to an independent country.”

I suggest we change or eliminate this. Links to Wikipedia articles serve to provide background. We could add a short description such as “the portions of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk regions that have been occupied by Russian and Russian-backed separatist forces since 2014,”[7] which could be in a table cell or an explanatory note. —Michael Z. 17:18, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

 Done I’ve gone ahead and removed this. Also removed “Russia” from Crimea for consistency, where all other disputed territories show only the internationally recognized sovereign state the territory belongs to. —Michael Z. 21:55, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

References for territories

Hi user:Dddrago. There are two sources cited for the Eastern Donbas line of the table only, and you changed the 2020 and 2021 figures to something else. Where did you get those numbers? Please cite your additions. Thanks. —Michael Z. 19:07, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

 Done I filled in the 2020 and 2021 columns, per the source, in the territories table. Since these values were wrong, and the rest of the table looked like random duplicates of one cell, I blanked the rest of it. —Michael Z. 21:58, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Filling in the table

I see that 2022 was not filled completely, and now the 2023 ranking is out. I tried to add the 2023 column, and I see that I just do not understand how i should fill our table in (I reverted myself). For example, in the 2023 ranking Afghanistan (alphabetically the first country; they also have Abkhazia) has 1 for political rights and 5 for civil liberties, 6 in total. Can anyone show me how I should add these numbers to our table, which has four or five different inputs, not three? If I learn how to do it I can then complete the 2023 column. Ymblanter (talk) 16:09, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

@Ymblanter Did you get any help? Is still still unresolved? (If so, maybe ask at WP:VPT?) _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 05:42, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

No, this is still unresolved. May be I will just set up a table in a different format on a weekend, if I have time. Ymblanter (talk) 05:46, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

Why remove the historical data?

Right now we provide data just for 2019+. Historical data is useful and should be restored. See ex. 2016 version of this article which had data on years 2010-2016.

If the full table was too unwieldy, splitting it into a subarticle could be considered, but plain removal of historical data is wrong. _{Piotrus at Hanyang| reply here} 05:38, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

PS. @Drmies, ProjectHorizons, and Jetro: - some folks who discussed this recently. I'll also add that historical data has additional value because it is very hard to find it on official FH pages, which are very biased towards recent status. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 05:45, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

User:Piotrus, you're not going to like my opinion: I don't think any of it should be in our article. And I wonder what these tables look like on mobile, or to visually impaired editors. Drmies (talk) 12:59, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

@Drmies I find this content encyclopedic and educational (I show it to my students, in fact). Now, long horizontal tables are not very nice in any medium, and thinking about anything wiki on mobile is painful, yes :P _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 23:22, 27 April 2024 (UTC)

Sure, Piotrus, but you know as well as I do that "useful" is not a criterion for keeping content...there's lots of stuff I think is useful too. Drmies (talk) 01:13, 28 April 2024 (UTC)

@Drmies Sure, which is why I said I find it it useful, educational and encyclopedic. We have plenty of similar large tables on Wikipedia. PS. As for mobile issues, one good news is that each section starts collapsed, so readers can ignore tables and focus on prose. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 01:44, 28 April 2024 (UTC)

Can someone fix a handful of map errors?

I changed the file myself however Wikimedia wouldn't let me update the original. The current version of the 2023 map doesn't include the Azores and Canary Islands, Puerto Rico (considered part of the US on Freedom House's website) and Svalbard (considered part of Norway on Freedom House's website). I also think two pixels to the south of Hong Kong should be coloured yellow as the current map doesn't seem to include Hong Kong Island or Lantau Island. Koiramainen (talk) 20:26, 29 April 2024 (UTC)