{"id":78644,"date":"2015-02-08T12:00:16","date_gmt":"2015-02-08T10:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=78644"},"modified":"2015-02-06T17:53:12","modified_gmt":"2015-02-06T15:53:12","slug":"global-freedom-in-decline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/trending\/78644\/global-freedom-in-decline\/","title":{"rendered":"Global freedom in decline"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Despite a recent study finding that <a title=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/general\/78612\/south-africa-is-the-most-miserable-country-in-africa\/\" href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/general\/78612\/south-africa-is-the-most-miserable-country-in-africa\/\">South Africa is one the most miserable countries<\/a> in the world, a new report shows that it is at least also one of the freest.<\/p>\n<p>Independent freedom watchdog, Freedom House, has released its 9th annual freedom report, looking at the state of global freedom in 2014.<\/p>\n<p>According to the group, the state of global freedom worsened significantly in 2014, marked by an explosion of terrorist violence, the use of more brutal tactics by autocrats, and Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p>There has also been a rise in the explicit rejection of democratic standards, and open disdain for democracy by autocratic governments, the report said.<\/p>\n<p>Freedom House noted more declines in freedom than gains across the globe, with the trend being seen\u00a0in the Middle East and North Africa, Eurasia, sub-Saharan Africa, Europe, and the Americas.<\/p>\n<p>Asia-Pacific saw an even split in declines and gains.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, however, declines in freedom were almost double the gains during the course of the year.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_78646\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a  data-lightbox=\"post-image\" href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Freedom-improvements-and-declines.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-78646\" class=\"wp-image-78646\" src=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Freedom-improvements-and-declines.png\" alt=\"Freedom improvements and declines\" width=\"600\" height=\"414\" srcset=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Freedom-improvements-and-declines.png 632w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Freedom-improvements-and-declines-300x207.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-78646\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Freedom improvements and declines<\/p><\/div>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">Least free nations<\/h3>\n<p>The Freedom House report looks at 195 countries across the world and scores them out of 7, based on indicators in two\u00a0main categories (also scored out of 7): Political rights, and civil liberties.<\/p>\n<p>Based on these scores, countries are then designated as free, partly free, or not free.<\/p>\n<p>In 2014, free countries only increased by one, with Tunisia rising from partly free to free.\u00a0Four countries &#8211; Burundi, Libya, Thailand, and Uganda\u00a0&#8211;\u00a0fell from partly free to not free.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, in 2014:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>89 countries (40% of the global population) are considered free<\/li>\n<li>55 countries (24% of the global population) are considered partly free<\/li>\n<li>51 countries (36% of the global population) are considered not free<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Of the 51 countries designated as &#8216;not free&#8217;, 12 are considered the &#8220;worst of the worst&#8221;, given the lowest-possible rating of 7 for\u00a0both political rights and civil liberties.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">Worst of the worst in 2014<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Central African Republic<\/li>\n<li>Equatorial Guinea<\/li>\n<li>Eritrea<\/li>\n<li>North Korea<\/li>\n<li>Saudi Arabia<\/li>\n<li>Somalia<\/li>\n<li>Sudan<\/li>\n<li>Syria<\/li>\n<li>Turkmenistan<\/li>\n<li>Uzbekistan<\/li>\n<li>Tibet<\/li>\n<li>Western Sahara<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">Freedom in South Africa<\/h3>\n<p>Looking specifically at Africa, South Africa remains one of the most free nations on the continent with a freedom rating of 2.0.<\/p>\n<p>With regards to political rights, South Africa scored full marks for its electoral process (12\/12), and maintained its position (8\/12) for its functioning of government, despite an\u00a0\u201cirregular expenditure\u201d bill of\u00a0R26.4 billion.<\/p>\n<p>However, increased restrictions on political events in the wake of the rise of &#8220;more assertive opposition parties&#8221;, caused a knock on the political pluralism and participation score (13\/16).<\/p>\n<p>According to Freedom House, leading up to the 2014 National Elections,\u00a0a\u00a0number of events sponsored by Julius Malema\u2019s EFF were suspiciously blocked or delayed by authorities on technical grounds.<\/p>\n<p>The report also noted\u00a0scuffles between supporters of the EFF, the ANCYL, and\u00a0the ANC-affiliated South African Students Congress (SASCO).<\/p>\n<p>In terms of civil liberties, South Africa lifted its position slightly in 2014, thanks to strike action being &#8220;less violent&#8221; than the previous year.<\/p>\n<p>With a freedom rating of 1.5, Ghana is considered the most free African nation, followed by Senegal, Benin, Tunisia, Namibia and South Africa (2.0) and then Lesotho and Botswana (2.5).<\/p>\n<p>All other African nations are designated as &#8216;partly-free&#8217; or &#8216;not free&#8217;.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_78648\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a  data-lightbox=\"post-image\" href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Freedom-map.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-78648\" class=\"wp-image-78648\" src=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Freedom-map.jpg\" alt=\"Freedom map\" width=\"600\" height=\"398\" srcset=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Freedom-map.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Freedom-map-300x199.jpg 300w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Freedom-map-1024x678.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-78648\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Freedom map (click to enlarge)<\/p><\/div>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">More on freedom<\/h3>\n<p><strong><a title=\"Permalink to What is freedom of expression in media?\" href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/media\/77981\/what-is-freedom-of-expression-in-media\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">What is freedom of expression in media?<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><a title=\"Permalink to Internet freedom in South Africa\" href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/international\/75278\/internet-freedom-in-south-africa\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">Internet freedom in South Africa<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><a title=\"Permalink to South Africa sinks in economic freedom ranking\" href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/international\/70455\/south-africa-sinks-in-economic-freedom-ranking\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">South Africa sinks in economic freedom ranking<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Despite a recent study finding that South Africa is one the most miserable countries in the world, a new report shows that at least it is also one of the freest.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":78652,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[9258,26,853],"class_list":["post-78644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending","tag-freedom","tag-headline","tag-south-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78644","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78644"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78644\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78654,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78644\/revisions\/78654"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}