Thursday, March 08, 2007

Which country do you think has the worst influence in the world?

That was the question asked to 28.000 people in 27 countries around the globe, and the results are interesting even though they aren't surprising. In the top three we have Israel, Iran and the USA. After asking each country (12 of them, plus the European Union), people had to say if they thought that that country had a good influence in the world or a bad influence. Following the top 3, we have North Korea (USA worst influence than NK? Think about it...), Russia and China.

This study has been conducted by the BBC World Service in coordination with PIPA at the University of Maryland. As Steven Kull, from the University of Maryland says:
It appears that people around the world tend to look negatively on countries whose profile is marked by the use or pursuit of military power. This includes Israel and the U.S., who have recently used military force, and North Korea and Iran, who are perceived as trying to develop nuclear weapons.
And he adds:
Countries that relate to the world primarily through soft power, like Japan, France, and the EU in general, tend to be viewed positively.
Here is the table showing the results of the survey
Country        Positive       Negative       Difference

Canada 54 14 40
Japan 54 20 34
EU 53 19 34
France 50 21 29
U.K. 45 28 17
India 37 26 11
China 42 32 10
Venezuela 27 27 0
Russia 28 40 -12
U.S. 30 51 -21
North Korea 19 48 -29
Iran 18 54 -36
Israel 17 56 -39
If you want to read more, go to Bloomberg.com, Elpais.com (in Spanish) or Yahoo News.

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