Who decides what counts as a democracy?

 Across Asia, countries such as Japan, Taiwan and Australia tend  to rank near the top of democracy indices, while others  including China, Vietnam and North Korea consistently perform  less well. Taken together, these rankings raise a question that  matters in Asia as much as anywhere: who decides what counts as  a democracy? 

At first glance, such rankings look authoritative enough. They  come with tables, scores and categories, and seem to promise a  neat answer to an untidy subject. Yet they are not simple  scoreboards. Each reflects a set of judgments about what  democracy really is. Is it mainly about free and fair elections?  About civil liberties? About whether institutions can restrain  those in power? Or about the broader health of representative  government as a whole? The answer varies according to who is  doing the measuring. 

The EIU’s approach is the broadest in political terms. Its  Democracy Index measures countries across five categories:  electoral process and pluralism, functioning of government,  political participation, political culture and civil liberties. It then  sorts them into four broad types: full democracies, flawed  democracies, hybrid regimes and authoritarian regimes. The  strength of this approach is that it tries to capture democracy as a  working political system, not simply a set of formal rights. It is  interested not only in whether elections are held, but in whether  democratic life functions convincingly overall. 

Where the EIU is concerned with the broad performance of  representative democracy, Freedom House is more squarely  interested in whether people are genuinely able to vote, speak,  organise, publish and dissent without intimidation or arbitrary  coercion. That sharper rights-based focus often gives its  judgments a different character. 

Source: EIU Democracy Index 2025 | Analysis: Democracy Asia | Design: Rahul  Bhise 

V-Dem is broader again, but in a more academic way. It  distinguishes between several kinds of democracy — electoral,  liberal, participatory, deliberative and egalitarian — and pays  particular attention to whether democratic quality is deepening  or weakening over time. It is therefore useful in identifying  movement: countries that are drifting away from democratic  norms, or edging back towards them. 

Even defining Asia is not entirely straightforward. The EIU’s  regional grouping includes Australia and New Zealand but  excludes Central Asian countries. Other indices cut the map  differently. That may sound like a minor technicality, but it is worth noting because even a regional league table reflects a prior  decision about who belongs in it. 

Still, some broad patterns do emerge. Authoritarian systems such  as China and Vietnam, along with closed regimes like North  Korea, consistently rank at the lower end of these indices. The  EIU’s latest assessment points to a growing bifurcation within the  region, with a stable group of high-performing democracies in  Northeast Asia and Australasia alongside increasing political  stress in South and South-East Asia. In its latest index, the  region’s average democratic score fell again, extending a six-year  decline and making Asia a drag on the tentative global  stabilisation seen elsewhere. Only Australia, Japan, New Zealand  and Taiwan are in the top category of full democracies. That alone  challenges some easy assumptions about the region. Any older  sense that South Korea, Malaysia or India belong comfortably in  the same front rank no longer fits this picture. 

Democracy rankings across Asia and Australasia highlight a widening gap between  high-performing democracies and more constrained systems. Credit: Economist Intelligence Unit, Democracy Index 2024 

The EIU’s regional table makes these contrasts visible at a glance.  New Zealand and Australia sit at the top alongside Taiwan and  Japan. India occupies an intermediate position as a flawed  democracy, reflecting relatively strong electoral competition  alongside persistent concerns about civil liberties and  institutional balance. The table as a whole underscores the  region’s uneven democratic landscape, where high-performing  democracies coexist with fragile and authoritarian systems. 

South Korea is one of the more revealing cases in the region. On  the EIU’s reading, the turmoil surrounding President Yoon  Suk-yeol’s brief declaration of martial law in late 2024 was serious  enough to push the country down into the category of flawed  democracy. Freedom House continues to rate South Korea as free,  with a strong score by regional standards. V-Dem suggests  something more hopeful still, placing South Korea on its  watchlist of democratisers. That reflects three different emphases. 

One index is responding to a constitutional and political shock.  Another sees robust protections for rights and liberties. A third is  asking whether the country’s overall trajectory may in fact be  improving. The differences are revealing rather than confusing. 

India presents another kind of problem. On one view, its 2024  general election demonstrated the continuing vitality of electoral  politics, with the ruling party losing the commanding dominance  many had expected. On another, the condition of civil liberties,  media freedom and institutional independence remains deeply  troubling. The EIU’s 2025 index reflects this tension, noting a  decline in India’s score amid concerns over electoral violence and  pressures on civil liberties. It is here that the contrast between the  indices is most instructive. One puts weight on the resilience of  electoral competition; another focuses more heavily on pressures  on rights and institutions. Neither approach is wholly wrong. But  they are not asking precisely the same question. 

In India, strong electoral competition coexists with growing concerns over civil liberties and institutional balance. Photo: Election Commission, GODL-India 

If there is one clearer positive story in South Asia, it is Sri Lanka.  After years of crisis and disillusion, it stands out in the latest  assessments as a country that has, at least in some respects,  improved. Freedom House identifies it as one of the more notable  risers in the current cycle as does the EIU. That does not make Sri  Lanka a model democracy overnight, nor does it settle the  question of how deep or durable the improvement will prove. But  it does offer an example of movement in a better direction, not  simply another example of democratic decline. 

Elsewhere in South Asia, the picture is more troubling. Pakistan’s  score fell to its lowest level since the EIU index began, while  Bangladesh and Nepal also saw sharp declines linked to political  restrictions and institutional instability. 

Taiwan and Japan, by contrast, show where the indices broadly  converge. Both continue to appear near the top of Asia’s  democratic field. Taiwan combines competitive politics with a  vigorous public sphere and strong institutions; Japan benefits  from long-established democratic habits and stability. They are  not identical cases, but both suggest that there remain countries  in Asia that perform well across quite different democratic  yardsticks.

Malaysia is more ambiguous. It still attracts attention because it  has often been seen as a country with reformist potential, yet the  latest evidence suggests a more qualified picture than any simple narrative of democratic ascent would allow. One purpose of these  indices is not to confirm old assumptions but to test them. 

What, then, should readers make of all this? Not that one index is  right and the others wrong, still less that democracy can be  reduced to a single number. The better conclusion is that  democracy is a compound idea. But as experience across Asia  shows, the process of building democracy is not always smooth or  stable, and can carry significant political and social risks.  Elections matter, but so do liberties. Institutions matter, but so  does political culture. Participation matters, but so does the  ability to restrain those in power. The EIU, Freedom House and  V-Dem all measure democracy seriously, but each gives these  elements a different weight. 

That is why their disagreements are so valuable. They remind us  that democracy is not a fixed formula but a contested and  evolving idea — shaped as much by lived experience as by how it  is measured. The most useful question, then, is not simply who  ranks first or who has slipped down the table. It is the larger one  behind every table and every score: who decides what counts as a  democracy?