The Atlantic Council, an American think tank in the field of International Affairs that aims at fostering international trade, recently released its 2025 Atlas Freedom and Prosperity around the World report where it ranked 164 countries globally in terms of two separate indexes, being the Prosperity Index and the Freedom Index. In details, the Prosperity Index score represents the average score of six equally weighted indicators being Income, Health, Inequality, Environment, Minorities and Education while the Freedom Index score represents the average score of three equally weighted sub-indexes namely the Economic, Legal and Political sub-indexes. The report commented that the current landscape is marked by the propagation of violent crises, tense global alliances and leadership changes in several countries that held elections during the year 2024. Accordingly, many governments have resorted to expanding their authority and marginalizing democratic institutions in defiance of traditional liberal principles. The report also commented on the connection between freedom and prosperity levels, indicating that the preservation and advancement of freedoms are essential drivers of sustained economic growth.

As far as scores are concerned, European countries dominated both indexes. In details, Nordic countries occupied the first four positions in the Prosperity Index with Norway coming in first position with a score of 91.0, followed by Denmark (score of 90.7), Iceland (score of 89.9) and Sweden (score of 89.8), noting that all the aforementioned countries enjoyed a “High” level of prosperity. The situation was basically the same for the Freedom Index, where Luxembourg (ranked second with a score of 92.7) and was the only non-Nordic country in the top 4. In details, Denmark ranked first (score of 93.4), while Finland and Sweden occupied the third and fourth positions with respective scores of 92.0 and 91.7, with all four countries also enjoying a “High” level of freedom.

Regionally, the United Arab Emirates ranked first in terms of prosperity (score of 79.4, global rank of 39, “High” prosperity), followed by Kuwait (score of 75.0, global rank of 45, “Moderate” prosperity) and Qatar (score of 73.0, global rank of 54, “Moderate” prosperity). As for the freedom index, Kuwait occupied the first position regionally (score of 66.4, global rank of 79, “Moderate” freedom), followed by Jordan (score of 63.7, global rank of 88, “Low” freedom) and Morocco (score of 61.3, global rank of 96, “Low” freedom).

Locally, Lebanon ranked 90^th on a worldwide basis and 12^th in the MENA region in the Prosperity Index with a score of 62.9 (compared to 60.7 a year earlier) and a “Low” level of prosperity, whilst ranking 127^th globally and 9^th in the MENA region in the Freedom Index, scoring 49.5 (compared to 49.8 a year before) and positioning under “Lowest” freedom status.