The Human Freedom Index (HFI) presents the state of human freedom in the world based on a broad measure that encompasses personal, civil, and economic freedom.

Human freedom is a social concept that recognizes the dignity of individuals and is defined here as negative liberty or the absence of coercive constraint. HFI is a resource that can help to more objectively observe relationships between freedom and other social and economic phenomena, as well as the ways in which the various dimensions of freedom interact with one another.

The HFI is based on 79 distinct indicators of personal and economic freedom. It is the most comprehensive freedom index so far created for a globally meaningful set of countries. The summary of HFI data given below covers 162 countries for 2016, the most recent year for which sufficient data are available to allocate an HFI.

A report was co-published in 2018 by the Cato Institute, the Fraser Institute, and the Liberales Institut at the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom and is available here, together with the latest full set of data.

It seems somewhat surprising that Hong Kong is listed separately, since it is now part of China. The reason is that its political system and laws are very different from China’s. The table below shows that in 2016 it was ranked as the third most free country in the world compared to China which ranked 135th. The recurrent protests by Hong Kong people against their government demonstrate they have significant freedom, even if they are not entirely happy with the way their democracy works.