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Economist Intelligence Unit: Romania, ‘ a deficient democracy’ with the media ‘ partially free’ and justice under political pressure
Romania occupies place 64, being considered ‘ deficient democracy’ with ‘ partially free’ media,the ranking regarding the democratic systems being elaborated by Economist Intelligence Unit, Bucharest being criticised due to the actions of the governmental coalition, leading to the reduction of the indepence of the justice.
Romania received a score of 6.44 out of 10 and occupies the place 64 out of 167 countries in the ranking ‘ Democracy Indicator 2017’ made by Economist Intelligence Unit.
As for ‘Electoral processes and pluralism’ Romania has 9.17 points out of 10, as ‘ The functioning of the governmental institutions’ the score is 5.71and at the level of ‘political participation’, 5.00. From the point of view of ‘ politica culture’ Bucharest has 4.38 score and as regards ‘ Civic rights’ 7.94.
From the point of view of the press situation,Romania has a score of 8 out of 10, with 31st place with the feature of ‘ partially free press’.
‘Romania registered a massive drop in the scoring, situation which reflects the continuous attempts of the governing coalition to weaken the independence and efficiency of the judicial system and block the efforts of some institutional structures as to combat corruption’ the report says. ‘ In January 2017, the government tries without success to adopt an emergency ordnance to the decriminalisation of the crime of minor corruption. In May 2017 the Judicial Commission of the Senate introduced amendments to a draftlaw which would have reduced sentences for authors of corruption deeds. Amendments to the criminal procedure codes which would limit the responsibilitites in case of corruption are under debate in the parliament.Until now, the civil society was the main obstacle in the way of aaplying these measures’ the report says.
The first places in the ranking regarding the state of democracy are occupied by Norway, Iceland, Sweden, New Zealand and Denmark. Other ‘ full democracies’ are Ireland, Australia, Canada, Finland, Switzerland, the Netherland,Luxembourg, Germany, the UK, Spain, Austria and Uruguay.
The US is 21st, being ‘ deficient democracy’ in the same category with Romania, France, Italy, Israel, Greece, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Chile, Poland, Belgium and many other countries.
The Republic of Moldova is considered ‘hybrid’ democratic regime together with other countries such as Albania, Turkey, Georgia, Liberia, Bolivia and Maroc.
Countries such as China, Belarus, Venezuela, Iraq, Afghanistan,Russia, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Lybia and Iran are considered ‘ authoritarian regimes’.