The Atlas of Impunity 2025: The Great Divergence: Summary & Review

 

      This is the fourth year the Eurasia Group has published the Atlas of Impunity. It tracks conditions, accountability, and abuse of power in over 200 countries. Impunity is power without accountability. The report argues successfully that the vast majority of the problems around the world are fostered by governments with high levels of impunity.

“Impunity is assessed across five dimensions: unaccountable governance, the abuse of human rights, economic exploitation, conflict and violence, and environmental degradation.”

“The Atlas is intended to provide a practical and accessible tool to draw attention to abuses of power and press policymakers for change. Impunity should also be a concern for the private sector, as wherever impunity thrives, business conditions deteriorate.”

     The report draws on 60 indicators from 24 credible independent datasets.

“The Atlas is developed in partnership between Eurasia Group and a global advisory board of human rights experts. The Atlas is made possible with financial support from the Andrew Carnegie Foundation, formerly Carnegie Corporation of New York.”

     The report first gives some quotes by the UN and some Democracy groups that democracy and accountability have backslid in recent years, including in the U.S., which has moved down in the ranks of accountability. Militantism, corruption, and human rights abuses are three of the most important activities of impunity.

     The report states that:

“…unaccountable governance is the most significant global driver of impunity.”

     This is expressed most readily in declining press freedom. In the U.S., the report suggests, the problem is growing “disregard for accountability norms.”

     The introduction also explains “why impunity should concern business leaders as much as it does activists, policymakers, and ordinary citizens.”

     For business, it is simply that where impunity rises, business conditions deteriorate. It increases political risk and enables corruption.

     In the introduction is a section entitled: ‘Six things you will learn from this report.’ This acts as a set of highlights or a concise summary of the report, so I will lean heavily on it.

1)        The great divergence in global accountability is widening. Here, they note that while average global accountability has remained the same, the gap between the most and the least accountable has widened. Accountability has improved in the most accountable and middle sections, but has deteriorated further in the least accountable countries.

2)        Unaccountable governance is the single largest driver of global impunity. Here they simply point out that “institutional decay—specifically the erosion of press freedoms, personal liberties, and democratic political culture—serves as a primary engine of rising impunity.”

3)        Most of the toll of conflict is concentrated in just a few territories. Here, they show that conflict around the world is highly concentrated in relatively few regions, but overwhelmingly involves high-impunity countries.

4)        Impunity is fueled by four underlying causes. These are given below:

 

5)        Impunity spreads through the erosion of the elements of accountability. Here, they draw on public administration scholarship to arrive at what they see as the four pillars of accountability, which are weakened by impunity.

6)        The US has emerged as a bellwether—its policies are both a cause and consequence of global impunity. Here, they note the Trump administration’s lack of accountability, and especially cite the dismantling of USAID, noting: “Cuts to aid have dealt severe blows to the global network of actors that uphold rules, norms, and human rights worldwide.”

 

     The graphic below shows how levels of impunity are scored.

“The Atlas of Impunity measures the extent to which a typical person living in each country in the world experiences impunity across five dimensions. These are the abuse of human rights, conflict and violence, economic exploitation, environmental degradation, and unaccountable governance.” 

     The graphic below is an example of the different scoring mechanisms used, such as press freedom and democracy indices, as well as showing that people in the average category of impunity can still be exposed to a high degree of it.

     The report notes that among high impunity countries, unaccountable governance, and conflict and violence are driving further deterioration. They also note that unaccountable governance has been the leading source of impunity since 2020.

     Below, they summarize conflicts around the world since 2020.

“Since 2020, conflict has become a more frequent threat across a range of countries. Over the last two years, war has affected at least 12 states in the Middle East either directly or indirectly. The effects of the 7 October attacks on Israel, the subsequent Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, and the US and Israel’s 12-day war and 2026 war with Iran have rippled across the region. These developments have added to ongoing conflicts in Sudan, Myanmar, Yemen, and Ukraine, as well as more limited clashes involving states such as Armenia, Azerbaijan, Thailand, Cambodia, India, Pakistan, Rwanda, and the Democratic Republic of Congo, among others.”

     They also note that reduced press freedom made the largest contribution to impunity in 2020-2025. Below is a more comprehensive graphic showing the four pillars of accountability, the drivers of impunity, and the indicators used in analysis.

     Below is a snippet of a stark analysis of eroding press freedom by a collaborator in the Atlas, the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

     Other indicators include politically motivated disappearances, ecological footprint, refugee displacement, electoral process and pluralism, protection of property rights (something many in the DSA in the U.S. do not support), democratic political culture, functioning of government, freedoms and civil liberties, and government integrity.  

     Less accountable governments often have lax environmental rules, and environmental protection does not rank high on priorities. In some rare cases, like Bolivia under socialists, they had higher support for environmental protection but were lax on other freedoms. Refugee displacement is often a result of conflict, but also of dysfunctional and highly corrupt governments, and as they note, growing illiberalism, as people escape due to the possibility of being targeted for opposing the government. Addressing impunity in countries that are the source of refugees could help solve the multiple migration crises occurring around the world. Weaker electoral processes and weaker pluralism are important indicators. We have seen this in Latin American countries, but also all over the world as leaders try to hold onto power and not allow people to oppose them in fair ways, such as through political pluralism and free and fair elections. They mention a tit-for-tat cycle in some countries, where even if a new government is legitimately elected over a government that has shown a lack of accountability, the new government will, in kind, show a lack of accountability to balance against it. Perhaps it’s not the best analogy, but the recent gerrymander wars in U.S. states initiated by Trump are perhaps a related example.

     The report notes that the Trump administration has enacted many executive orders that have advanced a trend toward illiberalism.

“Illiberalism has advanced so far that the president and many American voters are now vocal skeptics of the US’s twentieth-century ideals of universal human rights, free trade, and collective security.”

     Another section indicates that the effective halting of most U.S. foreign aid is likely to have serious consequences for accountability around the world While I agree with Rubio and others that several UN agencies and many NGOs are very unfair to countries like Israel and have unacceptable political biases, I believe more strongly that U.S. foreign aid on balance still had/has overwhelmingly positive effects on accountability and more importantly on humanitarian reduction of suffering. The report notes:

“While many of the canceled initiatives focused on economic development or humanitarian assistance, USAID grants were also an important resource for strengthening accountability. For instance, the individual grants canceled by DOGE included programs to boost state accountability and transparency in Nigeria, improve the quality and transparency of public services in Tanzania, fight corruption in Ukraine, strengthen the rule of law in Georgia, assist independent media in Myanmar, provide material support to refugees and their host communities in Uganda, and strengthen electoral processes in Armenia, Haiti, Tunisia, the Palestinian Territories, and Moldova, among other countries.”

     It still makes me a little sad and angry that the U.S. actively chose to stop supporting democracy around the world.

     In a section called ‘reasons for hope,’ there is a more optimistic outlook showing where positive changes have occurred. This was led by a decrease in discrimination against women, followed by a decrease in the number of battles and a decrease in state violence against civilians.

     Below is a map of the impunity scores by country. Below that is a list of the countries showing the most deterioration and the most improvement in the past year, and the same for 2020-2025.

   

     The graphs below show clearly how impunity increases default risk, political risk, and corruption.

     The report then explores impunity by region. North America is led by Canada, having the least impunity. Europe as a whole has the best regional score for low impunity. They note that impunity scores have improved in four of the countries seeking EU membership: Moldova, Montenegro, Albania, and North Macedonia. In the Eurasian region, Ukraine’s score remained the same. Corruption scandals there are problematic, although they are being addressed by the government. Russia has the worst score in that region, and Kazakhstan has the best. In Latin America, Venezuela and Haiti had the worst scores, followed by Nicaragua. Mexico, Cuba, Colombia, Ecuador, Honduras, and Guatemala also had low scores. Nearly all countries in South Asia had poor scores, led by Afghanistan, and followed by Pakistan and Bangladesh. The small country of Bhutan had the best score. In Southeast Asia, Myanmar had by far the worst score, followed distantly by Cambodia and Laos. In East Asia, North Korea has the worst score, followed distantly by China. Japan and South Korea have the best scores, followed distantly by Mongolia. In the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), there were many low scores. Yemen and Syria have the worst scores, followed by Iran, Iraq, and Libya. Israel has the best score. Syria’s score reflects the effects of its past conflicts, and the report notes that accountability continues to improve in the country. The report notes that the Palestinian Territories were not included in the report, but if they were, they would be number ten in the highest levels of impunity. Impunity in Sub-Saharan Africa remains very high in general. Sudan, South Sudan, and Somalia have the highest levels of impunity. Botswana and Namibia have the lowest levels of impunity.

     Below are the 25 countries with the highest impunity and the 23 countries with the lowest impunity. I should add that the overall scores reflect the combined index scores. Some countries may do very poorly on some scores and better on others, which might make them seem better or worse than they really are.

     The report’s conclusion includes the following warning:

“Countering the normalization of the abnormal”

“Ultimately, the most insidious effect of rising global impunity is its potential to normalize the abnormal. When the world's most powerful actors treat international law as optional and domestic checks as inconveniences, they invite similar behavior from other powers and autocratic regimes.”

 

    

References:

 

The Atlas of Impunity 2025: the great divergence. The Eurasia Group. June 29, 2026. Eurasia Group | Atlas of Impunity