HUMAN CAPABILITIES INDEX
Liberty × Human Development: Cambodia
73.5
HCI Score
8
Liberty Score
+65.5
Gap (HCI leads Liberty)
Capable Autocracy
Quadrant Classification
LIBERTY × HCI: ALL 91 COUNTRIES
CAPABLE AUTOCRACY FREE & CAPABLE NEITHER FREE BUT STRUGGLING LIBERTY SCORE → HCI SCORE → 0 20 40 60 80 100 0 20 40 60 80 100 r = 0.619 Saudi Arabia Mali Singapore Somalia Norway Cambodia
HCI TRAJECTORY (1800–2023)
0 20 40 60 80 100 1800 1850 1900 1950 2000 2023 31.2 73.5 Year HCI Score
KEY INDICATORS — PERCENTILE RANK AMONG 91 COUNTRIES
75th + 50–74th 25–49th Below 25th INDICATOR VALUE RANK 50th Voter Turnout 85 % 90th Life Satisfaction 4.9 /10 29th Gender Dev. Index 0.920 26th Infant Mortality ↓ 20 /1k 26th Adult Literacy 84 % 24th Life Expectancy 71 yrs 21st Electricity Access 95 % 21st GDP/Capita (PPP) $4,400 $ 16th Safe Water Access 80 % 14th Mean Schooling 5.2 yrs 10th ↓ = lower is better (inverted percentile). Sorted by rank, highest first. Rank among 91 countries.
LIBERTY–CAPABILITY INSIGHT
With a Liberty score of just 8 but an HCI of 73.5, Cambodia exhibits one of the largest capability-liberty gaps in the dataset (+65.5 points). This extreme decoupling — high human development under authoritarian governance — defines the “capable autocracy” archetype. The historical pattern suggests these regimes can sustain material progress for decades, but the correlation data (r = 0.619) implies a long-run gravitational pull toward either liberalization or capability erosion.
Data: Human Capabilities Index (HCI) — 15 indicators, 91 countries, 1800–2023. Pearson r (Liberty × HCI) = 0.619. Download full dataset (XLSX) · JSON API