About the Global Peace Index
The Global Peace Index (GPI) is the world's leading measure of peacefulness. The report presents the most comprehensive data-driven analysis to-date on trends in peace, its economic value, and how to develop peaceful societies.
The Global Peace Index covers 99.7% of the world's population, and is calculated using 23 qualitative and quantitative indicators from highly respected sources, and measures the state of peace across three domains:
- the level of Societal Safety and Security,
- the extent of Ongoing Domestic and International Conflict,
- and the degree of Militarisation.
The GPI was founded by Steve Killelea, an Australian technology entrepreneur and philanthropist. It is produced annually by the Institute for Economics & Peace, a global think tank dedicated to developing metrics to analyse peace and to quantify its economic benefits.
Methodology
Peace is notoriously difficult to define. The simplest way of approaching it is in terms of the harmony achieved by the absence of violence or the fear of violence, which has been described as negative peace. Negative peace is a complement to Positive Peace, which is defined as the attitudes, institutions and structures that create and sustain peaceful societies.
The three domains of peacefulness
The GPI measures a country's level of Negative Peace using three domains of peacefulness.
1. Ongoing Domestic and International Conflict: This domain uses six statistical indicators to investigate the extent to which countries are involved in internal and external conflicts, as well as their role and duration of involvement in conflicts.
2. Societal Safety and Security: This domain evaluates the level of harmony or discord within a nation; eleven indicators broadly assess what might be described as Societal Safety and Security. The assertion is that low crime rates, minimal terrorist activity and violent demonstrations, harmonious relations with neighbouring countries, a stable political scene and a small proportion of the population being internally displaced or made refugees can be equated with peacefulness.
3. Militarisation: Six further indicators are related to a country's Militarisation — reflecting the link between a country's level of military build-up and access to weapons and its level of peacefulness, both domestically and internationally. Comparable data on military expenditure as a percentage of GDP and the number of armed service officers per head are gauged, as are financial contributions to UN peacekeeping missions.
Full methodology is available in the appendix of the report. Download the GPI 2026 report
About the Institute for Economics & Peace
The Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP) is an independent, non-partisan, non-profit think tank dedicated to shifting the world's focus to peace as a positive, achievable and tangible measure of human well-being and progress.
IEP develops conceptual frameworks for defining peace, provides metrics for measuring it, and uncovers the relationships between peace, business, and prosperity.
Other IEP publications
In addition to the Global Peace Index, IEP publishes:
- Global Terrorism Index — measuring the global impact of terrorism.
- Ecological Threat Report — analysing the intersection between ecological risk and peace.
- Positive Peace Report — the institutional and attitudinal factors that build resilient, peaceful societies.
- Mexico Peace Index, UK Peace Index and other national studies.
All reports are available for free download at IEP Research.
Suggested citation
Institute for Economics & Peace. Global Peace Index 2026: Identifying and measuring the factors that drive peace, Sydney, June 2026. Available from: http://visionofhumanity.org/resources (accessed Date Month Year)
Contact
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For more on IEP, visit economicsandpeace.org