World Freedom Report 2009

Freedom House has released its 2009 freedom report. Some extracts:

• Only 46% of 193 countries are free, 32% are partly free and 22% not free
• 2.28 billion people live in not free countries
• 20 years ago 41% of countries were not free
• In the Americas there is only one not free country (Cuba)
• In Asia-Pacific 41% are free, 38% partly free and 21% not free
• In central and eastern Europe, 46% free, 29% partly free and 25% not free
• Middle East/North Africa has only 1 free country (Israel), 6 partly free countries and 11 not free countries
• Sub-Sahara Africa is 21% free, 48% partly free and 31% not free
• Western Europe has 24 free countries and a partly free country
• There are 119 electoral democracies in the world, down from a high of 123

In recent years there has been a small decline in both free and not free countries, with a growth in partly free countries.