2. Main Questions What is cross-national comparison? Why compare? Compare what? Compare whom? What is the correct information/data? Remember: You can compare anything, so long as the comparison makes sense, is appropriate to the question you are asking, and you have the information needed to do the comparison.
4. Does America have the greatest athletes in the world? -- To whom should we compare America? -- What information do we need to compare? According to the official website of the Olympic Movement, between 1896 and 2010, there are 25,362 Olympic Medalists.
5. Does America have the greatest athletes in the world? -- To whom should we compare America? -- What information do we need to compare? According to the official website of the Olympic Movement, between 1896 and 2010, there are 25,362 Olympic Medalists. Team (IOC code) Total Team (IOC code) Total 1 United States (USA) 2549 LAST Afghanistan (AFG) 1 2 Soviet Union (URS) 1204 LAST Barbados (BAR) 1 3 Germany (GER) 1099 LAST Bermuda (BER) 1 4 Great Britain (GBR) 737 LAST Burundi (BDI) 1 5 France (FRA) 730 LAST Côte d'Ivoire (CIV) 1 6 Italy (ITA) 627 LAST Djibouti (DJI) 1 7 Sweden (SWE) 604 LAST Eritrea (ERI) 1 8 East Germany (GDR) 519 LAST Guyana (GUY) 1 9 Hungary (HUN) 465 LAST Iraq (IRQ) 1 10 Finland (FIN) 455 LAST Kuwait (KUW) 1
6. Gross Domestic Product in USD (World Bank data 2009) — World 58,892,848 1 United States 14,119,000 2 Japan 5,068,996 3 People's Republic of China 4,985,461 4 Germany 3,330,032 5 France 2,649,390 6 United Kingdom 2,174,530 7 Italy 2,112,780 8 Brazil 1,573,409 9 Spain 1,460,250 10 Canada 1,336,068 11 India 1,310,171 12 Russia 1,231,893 13 Australia 924,843 14 Mexico 874,902 15 South Korea 832,512
7. Gross National Income (GNI) per capita, Atlas method (2009 US$) Country Name 2008 1 Monaco 203900 2 Liechtenstein 113210 3 Norway 84840 4 Luxembourg 81970 5 Denmark 58570 6 Switzerland 56770 7 Sweden 52440 8 San Marino 50670 9 Iceland 50410 10 Ireland 49810 11 Netherlands 48520 12 Finland 48100 13 United States 47580
8. Economic inequality from UN Development Programme. Gini scores range from 0 to 100, where the higher the score, the greater the income inequality. RANK Country Gini 2002 - 2008 1 Namibia 74.3 2 Comoros 64.3 3 Botswana 61 4 Belize 59.6 5 Haiti 59.5 6 Angola 58.6 7 Colombia 58.5 8 South Africa 57.8 9 Bolivia (Plurinational State of) 57.2 10 Honduras 55.3 67 United States 40.8 68 Georgia 40.8 69 Tunisia 40.8 70 Turkmenistan 40.8 71 Trinidad and Tobago 40.3
9. UNDP International Human Development Indicators: development indicators (for example, education, health, economic inequality) for 195 countries 1980 - 2010 World Bank World Development Indicators : 213 „economies” from 1960 – 2010 Economist Intelligence Unit Democracy Index : 2006, 2008, 2010 offers „ a snapshot of the state of democracy worldwide for 165 independent states and two territories—this covers almost the entire population of the world and the vast majority of the world’s independent states (micro states are excluded). ” Freedomhouse Democracy Scores : „ The survey includes both analytical reports and numerical ratings for 194 countries and 14 select territories ... each country and territory is assigned a numerical rating-on a scale of 1 to 7-for political rights and an analogous rating for civil liberties; a rating of 1 indicates the highest degree of freedom and 7 the lowest level of freedom. ” Transparency International Perceptions of Corruption Global Index : „ The 2010 Corruption Perceptions Index shows that nearly three quarters of the 178 countries in the index score below five, on a scale from 10 (highly clean) to 0 (highly corrupt). These results indicate a serious corruption problem. ”
12. Data sources common to worldwide indicators include: -- S urveys of firms , households , and individuals -- Expert assessments from commercial business information providers, non‐governmental organizations, and public‐sector organizations
13. Human development index 2010 (UNDP) Human Development Index (HDI) Life expectancy at birth Mean years of schooling Rank value (years) (years) 1 Norway 0.94 81.01 12.63 2 Australia 0.94 81.86 12.04 3 New Zealand 0.91 80.60 12.52 4 United States 0.90 79.58 12.45 5 Ireland 0.89 80.33 11.62 6 Liechtenstein 0.89 79.60 10.27 7 Netherlands 0.89 80.33 11.17 8 Canada 0.89 81.04 11.49 9 Sweden 0.88 81.27 11.62 10 Germany 0.88 80.21 12.21 11 Japan 0.88 83.17 11.48 12 Korea (Republic of) 0.88 79.80 11.64 13 Switzerland 0.87 82.20 10.27 14 France 0.87 81.65 10.43 15 Israel 0.87 81.15 11.91
14. Gini (income inequality) among high HDI countries HDI rank gini Rank country HDI gini 2000 - 2008 6 Liechtenstein 0.891 .. 17 Iceland 0.869 .. 4 1 United States 0.902 40.8 15 2 Israel 0.872 39.2 3 3 New Zealand 0.907 36.2 2 4 Australia 0.937 35.2 20 5 Spain 0.863 34.7 5 6 Ireland 0.895 34.3 13 7 Switzerland 0.874 33.7 18 8 Belgium 0.867 33.0 14 9 France 0.872 32.7 8 10 Canada 0.888 32.6 12 11 Korea (Republic of) 0.877 31.6 7 12 Netherlands 0.890 30.9 10 13 Germany 0.885 28.3 16 14 Finland 0.871 26.9 1 15 Norway 0.938 25.8 9 16 Sweden 0.885 25.0 11 17 Japan 0.884 24.9 19 18 Denmark 0.866 24.7
15. Military: Number in service (active and reserves) Rank Country 2008 % World -- World 27,469,342 1 China 2,885,000 10.50 2 India 2,582,000 9.40 3 United States 1,540,000 5.61 4 Russian Federation 1,476,000 5.37 5 Korea, Dem. Rep. 1,295,000 4.71 6 Pakistan 921,000 3.35 7 Egypt, Arab Rep. 866,000 3.15 8 Brazil 721,000 2.62 9 Korea, Rep. 692,000 2.52 10 Turkey 613,000 2.23 11 Indonesia 582,000 2.12 12 Iraq 577,000 2.10 13 Iran, Islamic Rep. 563,000 2.05 14 Myanmar 513,000 1.87 15 Vietnam 495,000 1.80
16. Military expenditure (% of GDP) Country Name 2000 2008 Change 1 Georgia 0.62 8.52 7.91 2 Saudi Arabia 10.59 8.05 -2.55 3 Oman 10.59 7.66 -2.93 4 Chad 1.91 7.31 5.41 5 Israel 7.78 6.96 -0.82 6 Jordan 6.25 5.88 -0.36 7 Yemen, Rep. 5.02 4.45 -0.57 8 United States 3.09 4.29 1.20 9 Singapore 4.64 3.95 -0.69 10 Lebanon 5.39 3.92 -1.47
17. According to the U.S. DoD baseline report 2009, “The Department manages a global real property portfolio consisting of more than 539,000 facilities (buildings, structures and linear structures) located on more than 5,570 sites, on approximately 29 million acres… the Department’s real property assets represent 57% of the federal government real property portfolio” (p. 2). Of the sites, 4,742 are in the U.S., 121 are in U.S. territories, and 716 are overseas, spread over 38 countries. There are 235 sites in Germany, 123 sites in Japan, and 87 sites in South Korea. http://www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/2009Baseline.pdf
18. Level of Democracy: Economist Intelligence Unit 2010 Rank Country Overall 1 Norway 9.8 2 Iceland 9.65 3 Denmark 9.52 4 Sweden 9.5 5 New Zealand 9.26 6 Australia 9.22 7 Finland 9.19 8 Switzerland 9.09 9 Canada 9.08 10 Netherlands 8.99 … 17 USA 8.18
19. EIU 2010 III Political participation 27. Voter participation/turn-out for national elections. (average turnout in parliamentary elections since 2000. Turnout as proportion of population of voting age). 1 if consistently above 70% ; 0.5 if between 50% and 70% 0 if below 50% 28. Do ethnic, religious and other minorities have a reasonable degree of autonomy and voice in the political process? 1: Yes ; 0.5: Yes, but serious flaws exist ; 0: No 29. Women in parliament : % of members of parliament who are women 1 if more than 20% of seats ; 0.5 if 10-20% ; 0 if less than 10% V Civil liberties 45. Is there a free print media? 1: Yes ; 0.5: Pluralistic, but state-controlled media are heavily favoured. There is high degree of concentration of private ownership of national newspapers ; 0: No 46. Is there freedom of expression and protest (bar only generally accepted restrictions such as banning advocacy of violence)? 1: Yes ; 0.5: Minority view points are subject to some official harassment. Libel laws restrict heavily scope for free expression ; 0: No