These 102 countries are more peaceful than the U.S.
The United States is less peaceful than 102 other nations and more peaceful than just 59, according to the 2016 Global Peace Index, a worldwide study conducted annually by the Australia-based Institute for Economics and Peace.
The assessment is based on data factors ranging from violent crime rates to political instability, weapons exports, and participation in ongoing wars. America scored particularly poorly on militarization and incarceration rates, but slightly improved its ranking over previous years.
The top 10 is primarily populated by smaller European countries: Iceland ranks first, followed by Denmark, Austria, New Zealand, Portugal, Czech Republic, Switzerland, Japan, and Slovenia. At the bottom of the list are mostly countries where the U.S. is at war: Wracked by invasion and civil strife, Syria comes in dead last, with the close company of places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Yemen, Libya, and Pakistan.
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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