Human Rights

Human rights have become much more protected around the world

Human rights are much better protected than they were one or two hundred years ago.

In the late 18th century, human rights were poorly protected. In many countries, people’s physical integrity and private and political civil liberties were not respected by their governments. The chart shows — based on data from Varieties of Democracy — that countries received an average score of only 0.3, on a scale from 0 to 1 (most rights).

Importantly, this early data does not include many countries that were colonies before 1900. There, human rights were likely protected even less.

During the 19th century, the protection of human rights slowly improved. But in the first half of the 20th century, some of this progress was undone, particularly during the World Wars.

The protection of human rights then improved massively in the second half of the 20th century. However, this progress has not been linear: there have been setbacks in the 1970s and recent years.

Despite these setbacks, human rights remain much more protected than only half a century ago.

The changes over time look broadly similar if we instead look at the extent to which people‘s human rights are protected by weighing a country’s human rights score by its population.¹

Human rights are much more protected in some countries than in others

There are large differences across countries in the extent to which human rights are protected.

The chart shows the distribution of the latest human rights scores — using data from the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) project – across the world. Countries with high scores have well-protected human rights. This especially includes countries in Europe and the Americas. But there are some countries across all regions that protect their inhabitants’ human rights well.

In countries where human rights are not protected, political violence lingers, people’s rights to their property can be tenuous, and their ability to move around the country and abroad, practice their religion, and voice their opinions and organize are limited or outright oppressed. These countries are concentrated in Africa and Asia.

While large differences between countries remain, many now protect human rights well, and almost all protect human rights much more than they did in the past.

Women’s rights are now much more protected, but there are big differences between countries

Women’s rights are much better protected than they were even 50 years ago.

In the late 18th century, women’s rights were poorly protected. In most countries, women did not enjoy civil liberties, could not participate in civil society, and were not represented in politics. The chart shows that the global average score for women’s political empowerment — based on data from Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) — was just 0.12 on the scale from 0 to 1 (with 1 being the highest).

The protection of women’s rights did not change much over the 19th century. It became slightly easier for women to access the justice system, and they could discuss political issues more freely, but strong limits on their civil rights and participation in society and politics remained.⁴

These rights became much better protected in the 20th century, especially in the second half. Women became freer to move around their countries and abroad and to participate in civil society. They gained the right to vote and seats in parliament in almost all countries, as well as access to senior government offices, up to the chief executive level.

This looks similar if we consider the extent to which women’s rights are protected by weighing a country’s score by its population.⁵

But this progress has been uneven and limited. There are large differences in the protection of women’s rights across countries.

Even in countries that score highly on this index, women’s rights are not protected to the same extent as the rights of men: women are more frequently subjected to sexual violence, receive less pay for the same work, and remain underrepresented in parliaments, ministries, and among chief executives.

LGBT+ people’s rights have become more protected in some countries

The rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and other people outside traditional sexuality and gender categories have become better protected in some countries.

In the early 1990s, few LGBT+ rights were protected. The chart shows — based on data from researcher Kristopher Velasco — that there were very few countries that protected core LGBT+ rights beyond the right to engage in same-sex sexual acts. There were no countries where same-sex partners could marry or adopt. None where a third gender was recognized, and only two where the gender marker could be legally changed with ease.

Over the last few decades, LGBT+ rights have become more protected in many countries. Same-sex sexual acts are now legal in most countries, and same-sex marriage and adoption, third-gender recognition, and gender marker changes are slowly expanding across countries.

Yet, most countries still fail to acknowledge these core rights. Some have even recently implemented policies actively restricting rights, such as explicitly banning same-sex marriages. Even in countries that legally protect these rights, LGBT+ people are still discriminated against in their daily lives, such as by disproportionately being subject to violence or struggling to access adequate healthcare.

The trends and differences between countries look similar if we look at the most recent data for 2023 from Equaldex on same-sex sexual acts, marriage, and gender marker changes.