Ukraine ranks 43rd among 102 countries in government openness, a new study by the World Justice Project, a U.S.-based non-governmental group of legal experts, found. Published on March 26, it’s based on public and expert perception of public access to laws and government data, availability of information, protection of freedom of opinion and effectiveness of complaint mechanisms.
Overall, Ukraine’s performance was most promising with publicized laws and government data (ranking 33rd globally), right to information (35th) and effectiveness of civic participation (38th) but lags behind many other countries with complaint mechanisms (74th), according to Juan Carlos Botero, executive director of the World Justice Project and co-author of the study.
“These findings suggest that the level of awareness and use of existing mechanisms to access government information or to submit petitions to the authorities, is higher than among other regional and income-level peers,” Botero says. “However, they also suggest that people’s ability to complain about provision of public services or performance of the government officers, is very limited in practice,” he says.
Ukraine placed 4th among 13 countries of Eastern Europe and Central Asia region where Georgia leads the way. In the list of 25 countries with similar economic development and gross national income per capita of $1,000 to $4,100, Ukraine ranks 5th after Georgia, Indonesia, India and Ghana. Also, in Ukraine, 94 percent of respondents said they were aware of the laws standing for their right to access of government data, while worldwide only 40 percent said they knew about such laws, the study found.
The index pertaining to Ukraine is based on answers drawn from a probability sample of 1,000 respondents of the nation’s three largest cities of Kyiv, Kharkiv and Odesa and a team of in-country experts. Worldwide, the study surveyed more than 100,000 households.
Kyiv Post staff writer Anastasia Forina can be reached at [email protected].
