We just published our “Top of the Charts”, a look at our most popular charts, articles, data insights & more in 2025! (link in 🧵) Here are our top 5 most-viewed charts. Each Friday over the next few weeks, we’ll share the top 5 for other categories (articles, etc.). Stay tuned! 1. CO2 emissions

Paths to Power (PtP) is out in @bjpols.bsky.social! It is a database with data on cabinet members' social profile globally from 1966-2021. This is a great team effort with @chknutsen.bsky.social, @peterla.bsky.social, @inalkristiansen.bsky.social. But many more helped us along the way 🙏 A short 🧵

🚨 out at @apsrjournal.bsky.social 🚨 ➡️ We ran a large media literacy experiment to fight misinformation ➡️ 13,500 students, 583 villages in Bihar, India ➡️Created custom misinfo curriculum of 4 months ➡️Partnered w the government to roll it out as an official course in classrooms hopeful findings👇🏽

First instalment of my substack primer on right-wing populism in Europe is out. jacobedenhofer.substack.com/p/explaining...

This is a fun short post by @global-developments.org: It may seem as if Chinese households consume less than people in other countries with similar income levels. But that might be instead because the country’s data overstates both inflation and GDP: www.global-developments.org/p/does-china...

In February, the US gov shut down the Demographic & Health Surveys. It was the only data source on maternal & child health, births, household structure in many countries – making it crucial for research. In a new article I explain why it should be rescued. ourworldindata.org/demographic-...

Been a busy year in the data mines.📊 Just published my mid-year roundup: 29 data visualizations on the state of US democracy, tracking everything from judicial resistance to billionaire influence to why Dems have a mobilization crisis, not a moderation problem. All charts free to use:

Cool that @economist.com‬ surveyed Brits about what they cared most about, and then put together indicators to track how the current government is doing on those issues! www.economist.com/interactive/...

Famines kill far fewer people today than they did in the past, but remain a major threat— Famines are still a major global problem. From 2020 to 2023 alone, they caused over a million deaths. Yet the long-term trend shows significant progress.

How can we tell a country is not a democracy (anymore)? One way of looking at it: When people are punished for peacefully opposing those in power — when they have to worry about publishing critical opinions, supporting opposition candidates, or protesting. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/08/o...

How do the rights of LGBT+ people vary across the world? 🧵 The first map shows the nearly 40 countries that allow same-sex partners to marry, affirming their right to love and form a family. However, the majority of countries don’t recognize same-sex marriage, or outright ban it.

The key chart right now: Usually US economic pain is cushioned by falling bond yields and a strengthening dollar, which mean lower interest rates and more spending power for consumers. This time we’re seeing the opposite, meaning the pain will be amplified.

How many people died in large famines over the past 150 years? 📊 We've updated the data in many of our charts on famine, including a big update from the World Peace Foundation (@worldpeacefdtn.bsky.social). This update was led on our team by @bastianherre.bsky.social and Veronika Samborska.

Several countries have recently managed to stop and even reverse the erosion of their democratic institutions. In each case, people resisted growing authoritarianism. This shows that when democracy deteriorates, its fate is not sealed, and democratic institutions can be reclaimed.

Chart of cumulative protests reported from Jan 22 - Feb 28, 2017 vs 2025:

Estimates by @charlesjkenny.bsky.social @justsand.bsky.social: US foreign aid likely prevents 2.3 to 5.6 million deaths annually, largely in Africa. And that a complete disruption would result in over 4000 lives lost per day.

The last paragraph of my new article, Voting in Authoritarian Elections. We first wrote these words in 2019.

More than 80% of countries vote, but less than 40% do so freely and fairly. Most countries grant their citizens the right to vote and have multi-party elections for parliament and government. But many fewer countries have genuinely competitive elections and freedoms of expression and association.

Very thoughtful by @mashagessen.bsky.social on why people self-censor and obey — concern for others, a supposed higher purpose, picking one's battles, if-I-don’t-do-it-someone-else-will, the zeitgeist — and why one shouldn't do it. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/08/o...

This is a good brief overview of the recent rise of hard-right parties in Europe, which have recently attracted more votes than conservative and social-democratic parties: www.economist.com/graphic-deta...

🚨New paper alert!🚨 @anthlittle.bsky.social and I are excited to share “Presidential Election Concessions.” We present a new global dataset on concessions in presidential elections in all countries worldwide from 1980 to 2024 /1

☢️ I've collected 800+ resources for those working on WMD issues in my "LearnWMD Spreadsheet" learnwmd.wixsite.com/learnwmd/the... Recently, I've gone through and updated all links & information. I've also broken out the OSINT resources into their own tab. Be sure to check it out!

How could @ourworldindata.org maps be better? Do you experience any annoyances or pain points when you interact with our maps? Is there something you wish you could do that you currently can’t? What’s the next cool thing we could build on top of our maps? Any notes welcome! Thank you 🙏

Dishonest charts are coming from all directions, and they're only going to hit harder. Unless we push back. So, an interactive guide: Defense Against Dishonest Charts flowingdata.com/projects/dis...

There has been a lot of debate over whether long-term trends of political trust reveal decline or 'trendless fluctuation'. We find while there are important differences between countries and global regions, trust in representative institutions (government, legislatures, parties) has been falling.

I look at democracy data for a living, and the US indeed seems to be in a constitutional crisis right now - but this move by Polity makes me take it less seriously, not more. Here’s why:

www.foreignaffairs.com/united-state... This is by far the best, clearest and most realistic analysis of what we're in for that I've seen.

120 million people are displaced worldwide. Advocates try to promote refugee inclusion by providing information that corrects common misperceptions, and by sharing refugee narratives that try to generate empathy; do these work? (1/9)

This article has some nice visualizations of the State of the Nation's Progress Report: The US is growing faster than other countries, but falling behind on important indicators of well-being. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/04/b...

On American aid cuts/disruptions: www.africanistperspective.com/p/american-a...

Global average life expectancy has more than doubled since 1900

How do autocrats stay in power? Our new research dives into the strategies of political control—repression, co-optation, and indoctrination—used across 229 autocracies from 1946 to 2010. What we found will change the way you think about authoritarian resilience. 🧵👇

Genuinely horrifying. 20 million people receive HIV antiviral treatment from the program annually. Mothers with HIV would transmit it to their infants at birth if not for perinatal antiviral treatment. This should be resumed as soon as possible. Every day of delay means more lives lost.

🚨New publication! We introduce the “U-Turn” as a new regime transformation where autocratization is closely followed by and linked to subsequent democratization. Key findings: • 52% of autocratizations become U-Turns, • 73% when focusing on the last 30 years www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.... 🧵

I liked this blog post by @jedkolko.bsky.social, about why official statistics get revised. There are things to rightly be concerned about. But often, revisions are a good thing: they correct errors, make the data more comparable, or improve its coding. www.slowboring.com/p/major-data...

The world is awful. The world is much better. The world can be much better. All three statements are true at the same time. Understanding this is key to solving big global problems. We believe data & research can help us understand both the problems we face & the progress that’s possible. 🧵

Blog: The Tenth Recipient Test. The median size for a bilateral aid country relationship (US aid to Vanuatu, UK aid to Cameroon for eg) is about $1.5 million. Only 7% of bilateral relationships are >$100m. 'Country programs' make little sense below that level.

In 2023, PEPFAR provided life-saving therapy against HIV to 20.5 million people

I’ve had many interesting conversations about the election & what the next Trump administration will bring. Is the US set to slide into authoritarianism? Will we wall ourselves off from the world? Is it a new dawn of American prosperity? Might Trump remake the whole political landscape? 🧵 1/N

Our World in Data is on Bluesky. You can find us here! go.bsky.app/RC8Wsup

The US military spends much more per service member than other major powers

The UK spends about £74 per person on overseas aid

We @ourworldindata.bsky.social now have a topic page on foreign aid! It allows you to explore data on who gives and receives foreign aid, the different types of assistance, and a few examples of when it has been successful. A thread on what the page has in store:

Their work was truly formative for me, and I was thrilled to have James as my doctoral advisor. I always appreciated how open he was to my research challenging his work. Congratulations to him, Daron Acemoglu, and Simon Johnson!

Tomorrow is #PeaceDay. What’s the current state of peace and conflict worldwide? We are closer to peace than for most of the 20th century, when many more people died in conflicts. But deaths have recently increased in the Middle East, Africa, and Europe. A thread with key charts:

Yesterday was International #DemocracyDay. So let’s check in on the development and state of democracy worldwide. The world has become much more democratic over the last centuries. But some of this progress has recently been reversed. A thread with some key charts:

Public social spending has increased very substantially in the 20th century. In the early 20th century, governments’ social spending at most amounted to 1 or 2% of their national income. Now, it amounts to between 15% and 30% of national income, especially being spent on healthcare and education.

I'm looking for data on how people in donor countries think about foreign aid, and what misperceptions they may have. There's great (if old) cross-national data by Ipsos, and Eurobarometer and YouGov also have some occasional survey questions. Am I missing anything?

What are some of the biggest successes and failures of foreign aid programs? Successes: PEPFAR, the eradication of guinea worm disease, GAVI, the Green Revolution? Failures: WHO's malaria eradication efforts in the 50s and 60, family planning initiatives in India in the 70s?

Here you go. 🫡 Please share widely to help develop the dataviz community of Bluesky. 📊 go.bsky.app/R3nSyyy