DUSHANBE, June 22, 2011, Asia-Plus — Deputy director of the Center for Strategic Studies under the President of Tajikistan, Sayfullo Safarov, considers that Tajikistan is ranked among the ‘failed states’ unfairly.
“It is not fair that Tajikistan and Uzbekistan are ranked among 60 countries considered to be “failed states,” said Safarov, “According to various parameters, both countries are on the rise and they are tackling many economic and social problems. At least we have multi-party system, public associations are working and civil society is developing.”
Besides, the senior expert from Tajik think tank considers that some indictors used by authors of the rankings for assessment of states may not be suited to Tajikistan. “Their method may include parameters that are not valued in Tajikistan. It is different mentality and different understanding of “success” and “failure.”
According to him, one of successes of Tajikistan is a peace process. “We have managed to settle our conflict and reach national accord,” the expert said.
We will recall that Tajikistan was rated 39 out 60 countries considered to be “failed states.” Tajikistan shared this place with Uzbekistan. The 2011 Failed States Index (FSI) was created by the United States think-tank Fund for Peace and the magazine Foreign Policy. In all, 177 nations were assessed. Kyrgyzstan is ranked 31st and Russia is ranked 82nd.
Three African states — Somalia, Chad, and Sudan — once again top this year”s FSI. For four years in a row, Somalia has held the No. 1 spot, indicating the depth of the crisis in the international community”s longest-running failure.
The new edition of the index draws on some 130,000 publicly available sources to analyze 177 countries and rate them on 12 indicators of pressure on the state during the year 2010 — from refugee flows to poverty, public services to security threats. And the latest results show how much the 2008 economic crisis and its ripple effects everywhere, from collapsing trade to soaring food prices to stagnant investment, are still haunting the world.
The report notes that perhaps the biggest challenge of all for 2011 will be dealing with the global fallout of the Arab revolutions, which began in Tunisia and quickly spread to Egypt, Bahrain, Libya, Yemen, and Syria.
Since 2005 the Fund for Peace and the magazine Foreign Policy, publishes an annual index called the Failed States Index. The list only assesses sovereign states (determined by membership in the United Nations). Ranking is based on the total scores of the 12 indicators. For each indicator, the ratings are placed on a scale of 0 to 10, with 0 being the lowest intensity (most stable) and 10 being the highest intensity (least stable). The total score is the sum of the 12 indicators and is on a scale of 0-120. The index”s ranks are based on twelve indicators of state vulnerability – four social, two economic and six political.
