Skip to content
Guest Thinkers

Yemen: Moving Up

Foreign Policy, in collaboration with the Fund for Peace, has published their annual “Failed States Index“, a highly scientific ranking of failed states. In what can only be interpreted as a continuation of Greg’s good news about water below, Yemen in the past year has moved up from 21st to 18th!

Wait- what’s that?

OK, I read that wrong and got excited.

At 18, Yemen is ranked as slightly more failed than the sub-sea level cyclone mating-ground Bangladesh, but happily more stable than the batshit-ocracy that is North Korea. Clearly, this is very subjective, despite the use of decimal points (and they admit it isn’t exactly foolproof, so I am not saying anything they don’t know). For instance, I am not sure how Yemen’s “Delegitimization of State” earns an 8.3. By comparison, the occasionally-genocidal government of Burundi only clocks in at 7.5. This all might be true- I am just unsure how to rank it.

I do think that this is an interesting list, and helps for those of us (me and Greg) who are entirely Yemen-focused. I think it discounts the perfect storm of disaster that is brewing in Yemen, but this is what this blog is for.

Any readers have any disputes with the list?


Related

Up Next