CENTER FOR ECONOMIC RESEARCH

Uzbekistan and international ratings. Why and how to improve its ranking positions? (2014)

Despite all the criticism addressed to various international ratings, one of their most important roles in the modern world is still as follows: to be a measure of success for countries in development. Ratings today extend to most facets of the state and society life affecting different aspects of human development, governance, business environment and other dimensions that shape conception of level of the country’s development and, ultimately, its attractiveness for foreign partners.

As far back as 40 years ago, GDP and GDP per capita was a key indicator for bringing countries into comparison by their level of development. This parameter was complemented with selected indicators from official crosssector line statistics. In doing so, discussions and search for the most optimal indicators of the country development measurement did not stop but no consensus was reached.

Traditional indicators were replaced by international ratings, which are both a product of globalization and the instrument of its expansion. Very shortly they came to be the most applied tools for collation of countries and regions worldwide and are commonly recognized by investors, donors and governments in their decision-making. It is due to ratings availability they became an integral part of external positioning of many developed and developing countries.

The views expressed in this publication are those of the working group and do not necessarily reflect the official opinion of the Center for Economic Research.

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