Finns enjoy greatest fundamental rights in world

The latest WJP Rule of Law Index measured the adherence to rule of law in 113 countries and jurisdictions, with Finland coming behind its Nordic neighbours Denmark and Norway.

Finland fared very well across all measurement factors, ranking first worldwide in terms of ‘Fundamental Rights’ and ‘Criminal Justice’. It also ranked highly in ‘Open Government’ (2nd), ‘Constrains on Government Powers’ (3rd) and ‘Absence of Corruption’ (5th), along with ‘Order and Security’ (6th), ‘Civil Justice’ (7th), and ‘Regulatory Enforcement (12th)’.

Since the last WJP Rule of Law Index, published in 2016, a majority of countries have seen their scores decline in areas of human rights, checks on government powers, and civil and criminal justice. Fundamental rights have taken the most serious knock worldwide, experiencing the greatest decline in the report.

Burkina Faso, Kazakhstan and Sri Lanka showed the biggest improvements in overall score since 2016, while the bottom three countries, Afghanistan, Cambodia and Venezuela remained the same.