Democracy in Europe can be comparatively assessed ^[1] according to various definitions of democracy. ^[2] According to the V-Dem Democracy Indices, the European countries with the highest democracy scores in 2023 are Denmark, Norway and Sweden, meanwhile the European countries with lowest democracy scores in 2023 are Belarus, Russia and Turkey. ^[3]

Changes in democracy

After the fall of Communism most countries in Central and Eastern Europe either democratized or re-democratized. ^[4] Some democratic backsliding can be observed in parts of Europe, including Hungary and Poland. ^{[5] [6]} The V-Dem Democracy Report identified for the year 2023 Montenegro and Kosovo as cases of stand-alone democratization and North Macedonia as a case of U-Turn democratization, while Poland as a small but statistically insignificant uptick in liberal democracy index. ^[7] Some view European democracies have become more consensual and less majoritarian over time. ^[8] Increased importance of constitutionalism has been claimed. ^[9]

Measures of democracy

The table below shows European countries scored on 2 high-level V-Dem Democracy indices and 4 mid-level Democracy Component indices evaluating the state of democracy in year 2023 which were published in 2024. ^{[10] [11] [12]}

V-Dem Democracy Indices (14th edition)

Country	Democracy Indices		Democracy Component Indices
	Electoral	Liberal	Liberal	Egalitarian	Participatory	Deliberative
Denmark	0.915	0.883	0.977	0.972	0.716	0.967
Ireland	0.896	0.831	0.933	0.875	0.634	0.905
Estonia	0.895	0.845	0.955	0.887	0.638	0.85
Belgium	0.895	0.814	0.909	0.931	0.648	0.91
Switzerland	0.89	0.844	0.962	0.931	0.882	0.98
Norway	0.886	0.836	0.955	0.961	0.655	0.988
Sweden	0.884	0.852	0.98	0.903	0.651	0.905
Luxembourg	0.878	0.798	0.91	0.939	0.578	0.975
France	0.877	0.81	0.93	0.811	0.632	0.939
Czech Republic	0.871	0.805	0.933	0.913	0.585	0.88
Finland	0.86	0.82	0.972	0.896	0.637	0.942
Germany	0.856	0.812	0.967	0.941	0.662	0.976
Netherlands	0.854	0.8	0.951	0.891	0.62	0.943
United Kingdom	0.852	0.772	0.914	0.81	0.66	0.843
Latvia	0.852	0.768	0.908	0.862	0.674	0.825
Portugal	0.845	0.751	0.887	0.795	0.611	0.872
Austria	0.844	0.773	0.926	0.893	0.65	0.827
Spain	0.843	0.757	0.902	0.841	0.645	0.828
Italy	0.837	0.757	0.911	0.904	0.747	0.911
Iceland	0.834	0.744	0.896	0.87	0.659	0.845
Slovakia	0.823	0.739	0.909	0.792	0.686	0.583
Lithuania	0.798	0.735	0.938	0.868	0.692	0.822
Malta	0.779	0.64	0.807	0.894	0.653	0.803
Cyprus	0.774	0.636	0.817	0.869	0.574	0.837
Slovenia	0.758	0.653	0.864	0.884	0.71	0.867
Greece	0.751	0.582	0.752	0.835	0.641	0.868
Croatia	0.733	0.639	0.879	0.768	0.625	0.68
Moldova	0.713	0.608	0.86	0.8	0.665	0.93
Kosovo	0.674	0.494	0.702	0.685	0.524	0.6
Romania	0.669	0.501	0.72	0.674	0.657	0.35
Bulgaria	0.666	0.588	0.898	0.76	0.663	0.914
Armenia	0.634	0.422	0.611	0.811	0.442	0.69
Georgia	0.604	0.473	0.761	0.784	0.542	0.803
Poland	0.588	0.444	0.729	0.877	0.555	0.719
Montenegro	0.581	0.467	0.785	0.771	0.561	0.759
North Macedonia	0.56	0.359	0.584	0.598	0.61	0.64
Bosnia and Herzegovina	0.512	0.346	0.616	0.655	0.527	0.678
Albania	0.51	0.402	0.75	0.706	0.555	0.444
Hungary	0.44	0.325	0.668	0.631	0.571	0.361
Ukraine	0.415	0.249	0.5	0.654	0.58	0.761
Serbia	0.364	0.253	0.579	0.747	0.55	0.486
Turkey	0.287	0.113	0.245	0.53	0.416	0.195
Russia	0.19	0.062	0.151	0.396	0.379	0.2
Belarus	0.157	0.036	0.082	0.734	0.161	0.044

See also

References