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in relationship to the other states, is generally very good, especially considering its recent history. In its historical context, it makes sense to compare Estonia to the other post-Communist states, and the easiest way to do this is with Nations in Transit. As already mentioned above, Estonia stands out for its high assessment (1.93) in Nations in Transit. A better general assessment for the 2011 results was only merited by Slovenia (1.89). At the same time, it must be admitted that the differences among the new EU Member States that are covered by the index, are relatively small – there are very small differences between the Czech Republic (2.18), Latvia (2.11), Poland (2.14), Lithuania (2.29) and Slovakia (2.50). Somewhat lower assessments in the group of states were earned by Bulgaria (3.14), Romania (3.43) and Hungary (2.86). The remaining groups of states are further behind – the average general assessment for the Balkan countries was 4.09, and 5.99 for the former Soviet republics (except for the Baltic states). If we compare Estonia to the other post-Communist states, based on the other indices, the results are generally the same – Estonia emerges mostly positively. The Freedom in the World index shows that Estonia is located at a slightly higher level than the average for Central and Eastern Europe, similarly to the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia, which were all given higher assessments for 2011, while the average for the given region is only a few tenths lower. Most of the other former Soviet republics and Russia are left out of the group of free states. The Polity IV index confirms this interpretation of the situation of democracy in the given region, although, unlike Lithuania, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and Slovenia, Estonia does not get the highest assessment, being one point short. The general trends are still the same – the post-Communist states in Central and Eastern Europe have all achieved close to the maximum result, while the remaining post-Communist states remain far behind. Therefore, the following can be said, based on the criteria of the indices under consideration: despite the small differences, Estonia, like the majority of the onetime transition states in this region, has reached a level of democracy that is at least comparable to the level in Western Europe. At the same time, there is still a lot of room for development before maximum possible democracy is achieved, which is alluded to, primarily, by The Economist’s index. It is also worth considering a comparison of Estonia with the high-level democracies in the global context. Here, it is again sensible to focus on The Economist’s index, which provides a somewhat more diverse picture and possibilities for interpretation. Based on this index, the highest assessment, in 2011, was earned by Norway, which received a general assessment of 9.80 points. The category of full democracies is comprised of 25 states, including many Western European states, but only one post-Communist state – the Czech Republic (in 16 th place in the global context). The next state to get a high rating is Slovenia, which in the democracy ranking is 30 th , followed in this group by Estonia, in 34 th place. Therefore, the general trend is the same – among the transition states, Estonia was one of the most successful. At the same time, if the remaining comparisons, which were less sensitive, placed Estonia at the same level as the old democracies, the potential differences with well-functioning democracies are still so large that, instead of in the category of full democracies, Estonia is positioned among the flawed democracies. However, when thinking about the assessments of these indices, one should keep in mind that, from a scientific perspective, these indices are not all equal in value. When compiling an index, one of the most important values is the transparency of the index 7 (Munck and Verkuilen 2002), which enables the reliability and validity of the index to be assessed. In this survey, Polity IV, for which all the information necessary for evaluating its reliability is freely available, is the only one that conforms to the requirement of transparency 8 . As far as the other indices are considered, the corresponding information is at least partially insufficient. If we leave aside the Polity IV index, we encounter problems, related to transparency, with all the other indices, and therefore, their reliability suffers in the eyes of the evaluator. In regard to the democracy indices, as with all other indices, it is worth keeping in mind that these are ways of interpreting political systems, which are often accompanied by inescapable problems. The process of compiling indices is so multifaceted that practically no index fulfils the conditions established for it (Munck and Verkuilen 2002), and even if agreement is reached on what democracy should mean, and how it should be measured, it is not possible to draw an indisputable line between democracies and non-democracies (Bogaards 2012). Thus, compiling indices is always a changing and developing process and, in summary, it would be sensible to take a look at the most recent development trends in this field of activity. One way to eliminate these shortcomings is to further refine the collection methods for the indices, or rather for the corresponding data, by using a greater number of indicators, and thereby, making it possible to assess the concept of democracy in a more multifaceted way. One initiative, which is now coming into use (Coppedge et al. 2011), aims to correct some of the errors in the existing indices by creating a database where reliable data, related to the various wide-ranging concepts of democracy, would be available in nonaggregated form (i.e. without being aggregated into one numerical indicator) for most of the world’s states 9 . This 7 Generally, this means that we must know what the criteria are that the index uses to assess the states and, for each assessed event, it must be known what assessment has been given for each sub-component and why. If the corresponding data is not available, the reliability of the index suffers considerably, regardless of how “credible” the results are or not. 8 In the case of Polity IV, in addition to the non-aggregated data, the website (see above) also includes a detailed manual for coding, or assessing, the states and separate reports for each state, which provides a brief overview of the background of the assessment. Therefore, in the case of the given index, all the interested parties have the opportunity to know exactly why and how the assessment for one or another state was earned. 9 Varieties of Democracy project: https://v-dem.net/ 72 Estonian Human Development Report 2012/2013
would be something that none of the current indices provides. Another approach, that has been suggested recently, points out that in order get a better understanding of democracy, attention must be paid not only to procedural criteria (institutions, as well as formal rights and freedoms), but also to their socio-economic context. This may mean not only the value added to the democratic institutions that function independently of the democratic institutions, but the preconditions necessary for their functioning (Munck 2012). In conclusion, it can be said about Estonia, that the assessment of our state’s freedom and democracy depends primarily on the index that you are looking at, on the states that Estonia is compared to, and what we are expecting from the concept of democracy. The position of every state, including Estonia, is determined only in comparison to other states and the more we pay attention to the indices with a high level of differentiation, the more accurate this determination will be. In the case of the Freedom in the World and Polity IV, which have a low differentiation capability, Estonia is positioned at the same level as the other decidedly democratic states. With the help of the indices with a greater differentiation capability – The Economist and Nations in Transit – it is possible to highlight some of the weaknesses of Estonia’s democracy, which are primarily related to the execution of authority, participation and political culture. These are the areas in which the gap between Estonia and the states with a high level of democracy is most noteworthy. Therefore, in order to raise the level of its democracy, Estonian must pay attention to eliminating the shortcomings in these dimensions. This is undoubtedly more difficult and time-consuming than the development of the main democratic institutions, since, among other things, these dimensions require changes and shifts in the attitudes and values of the authorities and the citizenry, which can only occur on a temporal scale encompassing several. References 1. Bogaards, Matthijs. 2012. “Where to Draw the Line? From Degree to Dichotomy in Measures of Democracy,” Democratization 19 (4): 690–712. 2. Coppedge, Michael, John Gerring, David Altman, Michael Bernhard, Steven Fish, Allen Hicken, Matthew Kroenig, et al. 2011. “Conceptualizing and Measuring Democracy: A New Approach,” Perspectives on Politics 9 (02): 247–267. 3. Munck, Gerardo L. 2012. “Conceptualizing the Quality of Democracy: The Framing of a New Agenda for Comparative Politics,” DISC Working Paper Series (23). 4. Munck, Gerardo L., ja Jay Verkuilen. 2002. “Conceptualizing and Measuring Democracy Evaluating Alternative Indices,” Comparative Political Studies 35 (1): 5–34. 5. Pettai, Vello and Martin Mölder. 2013. “Estonia,” Nations in Transit 2012, Democratization from Central Europe to Eurasia, Sylvana Habdank-Kolaczkowska, Katherin Machalek and Christopher T. Walker (eds.), New York, Freedom House, 201–217. Estonian Human Development Report 2012/2013 73
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ESTONIAN HUMAN DEVELOPMENT REPORT 2
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Table of Contents 1 Human Capital /
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Dear Reader Since the moment when E
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1Human Capital Estonian Human Devel
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the HDI’s content has also been h
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Figure 1.1.1 The human development
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Figure 1.1.7 The income sub-index:
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The results of the Princeton Projec
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the hypothetical generation. The to
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Figure 1.2.3 Life expectancy. Eston
Page 23 and 24: Table 1.2.2 also presents the most
Page 25 and 26: The new trends that are appearing i
Page 27 and 28: Figure 1.2.8 Components of populati
Page 29 and 30: New features were introduced into E
Page 31 and 32: Initiation of Voluntary Birth Contr
Page 33 and 34: Table 1.3.1 Best-known educational
Page 35 and 36: (OECD 2012b). Therefore a certain r
Page 37 and 38: The reciprocal dependence of the pr
Page 39 and 40: Figure 1.3.8 Percentage of students
Page 41 and 42: Table 1.3.4 The quality of educatio
Page 43 and 44: 1.4 Health Raul-Allan Kiivet Change
Page 45 and 46: Table 1.4.1 Usage of prescription m
Page 47 and 48: allude to the fact that approximate
Page 49 and 50: promote healthy lifestyles among th
Page 51 and 52: Figure 1.5.1 The World Values Surve
Page 53 and 54: Table 1.5.2 Estonia’s participati
Page 55 and 56: Figure 1.5.3 The percentage of the
Page 57 and 58: Figure 1.5.5 Percentage of the Esto
Page 59 and 60: The fact that Estonia’s position
Page 61 and 62: Summary Mati Heidmets The global vi
Page 63 and 64: 2People and Society Estonian Human
Page 65 and 66: Table 2.1.1 Structure of the Bertel
Page 67 and 68: tioning market economies (15 states
Page 69 and 70: 2.2 Freedom and democracy Martin M
Page 71 and 72: Table 2.2.1 Democracy indicators Po
Page 73: Figure 2.2.2 The distribution of th
Page 77 and 78: political participation are general
Page 79 and 80: strongest, while a very small perce
Page 81 and 82: is concerned, Estonia is one of the
Page 83 and 84: Figure 2.4.2 Average circulation of
Page 85 and 86: 2.5 Corruption Jüri Saar In accord
Page 87 and 88: Lithuania, 61%; and in Russia, 69%.
Page 89 and 90: 2.6.2 Intentional homicides in Esto
Page 91 and 92: crime. And thirdly, there was a wis
Page 93 and 94: References 1. Ahven, A. & Tabur, L.
Page 95 and 96: states included in the EU Kids Onli
Page 97 and 98: 2.8 Public assessments of the state
Page 99 and 100: Figure 2.8.4 Changes releated to tr
Page 101 and 102: of the state’s development are en
Page 103 and 104: Table 2.9.1 The positions of Estoni
Page 105 and 106: 3. IEP (2011). Structures of Peace.
Page 107 and 108: 3Welfare and the Quality of Life Es
Page 109 and 110: choices made, not what people say t
Page 111 and 112: Figure 3.1.5 Public social spending
Page 113 and 114: tion agreed upon the social contrac
Page 115 and 116: References 1. Aidukaite, J. (2006).
Page 117 and 118: hand, to the “inequality of acces
Page 119 and 120: and explanations of the extent of i
Page 121 and 122: 5- much more than I deserve. Some d
Page 123 and 124: people in Estonia consider the inco
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Table 3.3.1 Experienced Well-Being
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at about 70%. In Latvia and Lithuan
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sign. It seems that the usual view
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3.4 Quality of life Anu Toots 3.4.1
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a uniform composite indicator has n
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3.4.6 The components of life qualit
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Figure 3.4.4c Perceived quality of
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Figure 3.4.5 Changes in the depriva
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3.5 Environment dimension of well-b
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Figure 3.5.1.b Estonia’s position
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3.5.4 Energy intensity The energy i
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productivity, which is defined as t
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perceive themselves as worse off th
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4The Economy Estonian Human Develop
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vide a valuable connection for maki
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Figure 4.1.3 Components of economic
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ule of law, the sub-indicators for
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References 1. Acemoglu, D.; Robinso
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Development Report employs generali
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and pasture land, and this was capi
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Basing the total and net savings re
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4.3 Labour market Reelika Leetmaa,
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The problems include the very limit
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• Expenditures for active labour
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who lose their jobs. These ensure i
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4.4 Productivity and the economic s
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labour costs at the company level r
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Table 4.4.4 Comparison of the produ
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Figure 4.4.1 Annual average increas
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4.5 Innovation Erik Terk, Katrin M
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Table 4.5.2 Comparison of innovatio
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Table 4.5.4 Comparison of the indic
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in order to make the R&D potential
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It is characteristic of the South K
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mechanisms for increasing their sta
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Globalisation and Policy Patterns 5
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When Estonia regained its independe
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5.2 The impacts of globalisation an
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Table 5.2.2 Support of the differen
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5.3 Development policies Erik Terk,
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• C -the “Estonia-centred” su
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Figure 5.4.1 Support for the possib
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Summary Erik Terk Estonia is part o
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ehavioural patterns. Therefore, it
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EDR 2012/2013 authors Clemens Buche
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EDR 2012/2013 authors Alari Purju i
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Editor-in-Chief: Mati Heidmets Prod
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