Freedom House releases 2007 Freedom in the World scores

Freedom House released its Freedom in the World 2007 report on Wednesday (Jan. 17). MCC uses this worldwide survey for two of its Ruling Justly indicators, Political Rights and Civil Liberties.

Of note in the new data:
East Timor, Madagascar and Sri Lanka all report a decline in aggregate scores on either Civil Liberties, Political Rights, or both, compared to last year's survey.

• East Timor's decline in Civil Liberties is attributed to setbacks including police compliance in violence last spring, impunity for security officers, and laws limiting freedom of expression. East Timor is an eligible country (previously selected as a Threshold country), but has not yet submitted a compact to the MCC.
• Madagascar, a compact country, showed a decline in Political Rights due to election irregularities.
• Sri Lanka, an eligible country with a compact proposal into the MCC, declined on both its Political Rights and Civil Liberties scores due to an upswing in ethnic tensions and a resurgence of the Tamil Tigers, a secessionist group.

This year's change in score is an important consideration for these three MCA countries. Strictly for the purposes of the MCA selection, however, these declines alone are unlikely to affect their eligibility status. All three performed well on the Ruling Justly indicators in years past, passing all six (Madagascar and Sri Lanka) or five out of six (East Timor) indicators in the FY2007 round.