Thailand ranks 72 in Democracy Index 2021

The Economist Intelligence Unit has officially deemed Thailand a “flawed democracy” out of four categories: full democracies, flawed democracies, hybrid regimes, and authoritarian regimes. It ranked Thailand 72 out of 167 countries in its “Democracy Index 2021,” which ranks countries for how democratic they are. The EIU says democracy has declined across the globe since 2020. That year, 49.4% of people in the world lived in some sort of democracy. Today, 45.7% do.

The world’s top five democracies are Norway, New Zealand, Finland, Sweden, and Iceland. Thailand ranks below Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Singapore on the index. The EIU said the worst year for democracy it ever recorded was 2010. The EIU first created the index in 2006. The groups says right now, only 6.4% of people live in a “full democracy.”

In the democracy index, Thailand is in the same…