Ranking Belarus on competitiveness and economic freedom

DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/JEPP-07-2019-108
Published date08 July 2019
Pages226-240
Date08 July 2019
AuthorAnthony Evans,Sierz Naurodski
Subject MatterStrategy,Entrepreneurship,Business climate/policy
Ranking Belarus on
competitiveness and
economic freedom
Anthony Evans
ESCP Europe Business School, London, UK, and
Sierz Naurodski
CASE Belarus, Warsaw, Poland
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to provide primary data so that Belarus can be incorporated into
existing Global Performance Indicators (GPIs).
Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted a survey following World Economic Forum
(WEF) methods and combined our data with publicly available information.
Findings The authors find that Belarus would have risen from 61st in the 2012/2013 Global
Competitiveness Index to 55th in 2013/2014. The authors also estimate a position of 125th on the 2018
Economic Freedom Index.
Research limitations/implications Many GPIs have flaws and the findings outline how they can be
improved to gain more accurate views.
Practical implications Policymakers can now make meaningful judgments around how competitive the
Belarusian economy is, and the extent of economic freedom relative to its peers.
Social implications Belarus has received sanctions on account of its policy environment and this paper
sheds light on the current state of economic freedom.
Originality/value The paper utilises primary data that has been previously unpublished in the
English language.
Keywords Competitiveness, Economic freedom, Belarus, Global performance indicators
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Over recent years there has been a proliferation of attempts to rank countries. Kelley and
Simmons (2014) define Global Performance Indicators (GPIs) as public, comparative and
cross-national indicators that governmental, intergovernmental and/or private actors use
regularly to attract attention to the relative performance of countries in a given policy area.
In particular, they focus on indicators that are publicly available (i.e. not proprietary);
inclusive (i.e. intend to cover as many countries as possible); regular (i.e. updated annually);
comparative (i.e. provide a measure as opposed to a mere commentary); and purposive
(i.e. intended to affect policy). Based on these criteria they claim that no GPIs existed prior to
1970, and under 20 by 1995. They identify a large increase in numbers (more than doubling)
between 19951999 and 20002004; and as of as of 2014 they counted just under 160. They
identify the prominence of economics indices, with more than 50 of the list serving that
discipline. Over 40 indices focussed on social issues, whilst development, governance, the
environment and finance follow.
In sequence with their spread, GPIs have become increasingly important as governance
tools. There are several examples of governments using rankings as a stated policy goal.
Hong Kong took great pride in topping the Heritage Foundations Index of Economic
Freedom, however, in 1998 the Hong Kong government bought lots of securities in response
to the East Asian financial crisis. Heritage put an asterix on their No. 1 slot that year with a
warning to say that they could be No. 2 the following year if those securities were not sold
off in the intervening period. To avoid losing ground to Singapore, Hong Kong made a
Journal of Entrepreneurship and
Public Policy
Vol. 8 No. 2, 2019
pp. 226-240
© Emerald PublishingLimited
2045-2101
DOI 10.1108/JEPP-07-2019-108
Received 13 November 2018
Accepted 23 December 2018
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/2045-2101.htm
226
JEPP
8,2

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