World Power Index

World Power Index (WPI) is defined as the numeric expression that expresses the accumulation of national capabilities that a State has to exercise its power in the international system. The WPI is resulting from the addition of 18 indicators, which are themselves organized through three composite indexes:

• Material Capacities Index (MCI),
• Semi-Material Capacities Index (SMCI),
• Immaterial Capacities Index (IMCI).

The WPI is presented as a quantitative analysis technique, seeks help to overcome the hermeneutics underlying the subjective interpretation of power in international relations. Thus, the IPM contributes to the accurate comparison of national capacities and the study of the international structure.

Background

According to Karl Höhn, "power formulas seek to measure mathematically the power resources of a given set of countries in order to make those countries comparable to one another. A power formula typically consists of quantified power indicators". In that sense, World Power Index is just a quantitative technique to approach the study of the power of states and the analysis of the international structure.

The WPI went through two preliminary tests, which were subject to revision. The first, published in 2008 and named Structural Positioning Indicator (SPI), expressed national power as a combination of material factors (which were set as hard capacities) and intangible factors (identified as soft skills). These sets of factors were processed through a mathematical function that considered both: metric and ordinal variables. Although it proved to be a useful tool to define and explain the roles of some countries in the international system (specifically Mexico and Brazil), the SPI showed certain shortcomings: 1) if included or subtracted from the analysis any State, the "ranks" built the position of countries resulted significantly altered, and thus, all the SPI; 2) not had an exact Human Poverty Index (indispensable for measuring soft capacities) for the vast majority of states included in analysis; 3) was inoperative handle a structural positioning indicator 3639.111 for US and 0.025 for Burundi; 4) it was very difficult to obtain information for a longer time space that would show trends in the medium and long term. After this exercise, it continued rehearsing in the measurement of power. In 2011 was published the second trial as part of the book Potencias medias y potencias regionales en el sistema político internacional de Guerra Fría y Posguerra Fría. The main limitation of this second test resided in their inability to distinguish theoretically and methodologically between immaterial capacities and semi-materials capacities: the dichotomous view of hard power/soft power of Joseph Nye finally prevailed and engage the index (although not theoretical findings about the nature, characteristics and roles of the powers studied). With its diffusion, the Index was subject to various critiques and observations, which that contributed to its improvement. All this led to the third and most comprehensive test of WPI. New World Power Index, published in 2015 as part of Volume I of the work Poder, estructura y hegemonía: pautas para el estudio de la gobernanza internacional not only considers the three dimensions of national power as ontological and epistemological starting point, but also it presents first results of WPI (and their respective sub-indexes) to more than 160 countries.

WPI components

The power of a State is relative to the power of the rest of the state actors from the international system. Likewise, an index is a figure which expresses a relative relationship among a data sequence. An indicator is an absolute value, so it does not reflect a correlation with other values; instead, an index -which is constructed from a consideration of the maximum and minimum values- reaches more clearly show this relativity.

However, there is a huge disparity between the maximum and minimum values internationally. To overcome this problem, the WPI submits each of the values to a logarithm with base 10. This process allows approximate the most extreme data, but equally keeping their original values. So, the WPI is formulated on the basis of three sub-indices that relate the economic-military power, socio-institutional power and communicative-cultural power of a state.

Material Capacities Index (MCI)

Material Capacities Index (MCI) was first published in the book Potencias medias y potencias regionales en el sistema político internacional de Guerra Fría y Posguerra Fría. In an improvement of this, all the original indicators remained and Total reserves (includes gold, current US $) was added as a new indicator. The MCI is a composite index that seeks to reflect more broadly the economic and military power of states from considering six variables:

• national production,
• total area,
• military expenditure,
• spending on research and development,
• international commerce,
• foreign-exchange reserves.

By 2013, countries with the greatest material capacities were:

Ranking	Country	MCI 2013
1	United States	0.977
2	China	0.948
3	Japan	0.877
4	Germany	0.842
5	Russia	0.828
6	France	0.820
7	Brazil	0.814
8	United Kingdom	0.806
9	India	0.802
10	Canada	0.792
11	Italy	0.788
12	Australia	0.778
13	Korea, Rep.	0.774
14	Spain	0.746
15	México	0.746
16	Saudi Arabia	0.736
17	Turkey	0.725
18	Switzerland	0.717
19	Netherlands	0.711
20	Indonesia	0.703

MCI results for the rest of the world have been published for the first time in Poder, estructura y hegemonía: pautas para el estudio de la gobernanza internacional. Volumen I: Índice de Poder Mundial, work that summarizes annual results from 1975 to 2013.

Semi-Material Capacities Index (SMCI)

Semi-Material Capacities Index was also first published in the book Potencias medias y potencias regionales en el sistema político internacional de Guerra Fría y Posguerra Fría, but with the name of Intangible Capacities Index. In a review of it, its name was changed to Semi-Material Capacities Index (SMCI) because it was not intended measure communicative-cultural or immaterial power, but the dimension that corresponds to the socio-institutional power and it is theoretically placed between power material and immaterial power: "semi-material" power.

To maintain methodological congruence with the MCI, the Human Development Index (which was originally considered to weigh the semi-material capacities) was removed because it is a composite index. Instead, they were embedded one pair of simple indexes. Thus, SMCI is a composite index that seeks to refer the socio-institutional power of a State from considering six variables:

• national production per capita,
• population,
• per capita consumption,
• per capita energy consumption,
• spending on education,
• health spending.

By 2013, countries with the greatest semi-material capacities were:

Ranking	Country	SMCI 2013
1	United States	0.873
2	Norway	0.830
3	Switzerland	0.816
4	Japan	0.811
5	Australia	0.811
6	Germany	0.806
7	Canada	0.806
8	France	0.793
9	United Kingdom	0.787
10	Sweden	0.786
11	Netherlands	0.772
12	Denmark	0.765
13	Italy	0.762
14	Austria	0.762
15	Belgium	0.754
16	Qatar	0.751
17	Finland	0.750
18	Spain	0.736
19	Singapore	0.729
20	Korea, Rep.	0.728

SMCI results for the rest of the world are also available in Poder, estructura y hegemonía: pautas para el estudio de la gobernanza internacional. Volumen I: Índice de Poder Mundial, from 1975 to 2013.

Immaterial Capacities Index (IMCI)

Immaterial Capacities Index (IMCI) represents the first attempt to measure the communicative-cultural power or what has been expressed by others as soft power or symbolic power. IMCI is another composite index, made from six variables that are intended to reflect more broadly cultural communicative power of a State from:

• government expenditure,
• international tourism receipts,
• official development assistance per capita,
• number of telephone lines,
• number of articles in scientific and technical journals,
• stock of international migrants.

By 2013, countries with the greatest immaterial capacities were:

Ranking	Country	IMCI 2013
1	United States	0.995
2	China	0.919
3	Germany	0.894
4	Japan	0.889
5	France	0.885
6	United Kingdom	0.873
7	Italy	0.850
8	Russia	0.850
9	Canada	0.844
10	Spain	0.834
11	Australia	0.822
12	India	0.799
13	Netherlands	0.795
14	Korea, Rep.	0.794
15	Brazil	0.792
16	Saudi Arabia	0.763
17	Sweden	0.762
18	Belgium	0.751
19	Switzerland	0.738
20	Poland	0.737

IMCI results for other countries are available on Poder, estructura y hegemonía: pautas para el estudio de la gobernanza internacional. Volumen I: Índice de Poder Mundial for the period 1975-2013.

Development and results of World Power Index (WPI)

Material capacities are related to the macroeconomic activity, defense and research in the State; semi-material capacities, which are intermediate and secondary, relate to the individual wealth, the overall situation of the population and the welfare of society-national; finally, the immaterial capacities that are related to tourism and cultural attractiveness of a country, its cosmopolitanism and the international scope of its media, its universities and think tanks. Measuring these capacities through MCI, SMCI IMCI and add them, is possible to obtain data that provides a multivariate and multidimensional reading of the capacities of a state: the World Power Index (WPI).

WPI is understood as "the numerical expression of the relation between three composite indexes that illustrate the material, semi-material and immaterial capacities that has a nation-state to exercise its power in the international system".

WPI results for 2013 were:

Ranking	Country	WPI 2013
1	United States	0.951
2	Japan	0.861
3	Germany	0.847
4	China	0.843
5	France	0.831
6	United Kingdom	0.821
7	Canada	0.812
8	Australia	0.800
9	Italy	0.799
10	Russia	0.787
11	Spain	0.770
12	Korea, Rep.	0.766
13	Brazil	0.759
14	Netherlands	0.755
15	Switzerland	0.753
16	Sweden	0.744
17	Norway	0.738
18	Saudi Arabia	0.732
19	Belgium	0.719
20	Austria	0.709

Similarly, the results of the WPI for all countries are available on Poder, estructura y hegemonía: pautas para el estudio de la gobernanza internacional. Volumen I: Índice de Poder Mundial.

Applications of World Index Power

To be computed, the WPI needs the maximum and minimum values that may exist worldwide. To consider, this statistical tool allows identify the specific position of any country in the hierarchy of world power and thereby proceed to design a model of international structure in which each category of States has its own characteristics and roles.

WPI has become analysis technique with huge heuristic potential for several scholars of international relations, particularly for the members of the Research Group on World Policy, who have developed as case studies: México, Brasil, China, the G7, BRICS, Latin America, subregional powers and, from a broader historical perspective, political cycles of world hegemonies.