Empire Rankings is Ezana’s quantitative view of national power, inspired by Ray Dalio’s Changing World Order. Each country is scored across 18 dimensions and combined into a single score, rank, and trajectory.
The 18 dimensions
- Economic: Debt Burden, Expected Growth, Economic Output, Markets & Financial Center, Reserve Currency Status, Trade, Cost Competitiveness.
- Military: Military Strength, Geology, Resource Efficiency, Internal Conflict, Infrastructure.
- Social: Education, Innovation & Technology, Character & Civility, Rule of Law, Wealth Gaps, Acts of Nature.
How it works
The page opens with each country’s Current Score, Global Rank, and Trajectory, followed by Global Power Rankings, Country Scorecards, a Power Dimension Comparison radar, The Big Cycle chart, Debt Burden Cycles, Reserve Currency Share, and Military Strength. On the radar, the Focus control narrows the view to All 18, Economic, Military, or Social dimensions.
Step-by-step: using the Big Cycle chart
- Open Research → Global Market Analysis and click Empire Ranking & Analysis.
- In the all-countries view, the US, China, UK, Germany, and Japan are pinned by default.
- Hover a line to highlight it, or click the pin in the legend to pin or unpin a country.
- Click Reset pins to return to the default set.
- Switch to a single country and change the time window to study one trajectory.
Where the data comes from
World Bank Open Data is the source integrated today. Connectors for other providers (IMF, SIPRI, WIPO, UNESCO, FRED) are planned but not currently integrated, so dimensions that depend on them have thinner coverage. For countries without a modeled long-run history, the Big Cycle curve is an illustrative rise-and-decline shape based on current economic rank, not a measured series.
Things to know
- Empire Rankings carries a v1.0 badge during the beta and may open a notice that it is not yet enabled for your account.
- Any aggregate depends on how the dimensions are weighted. Use the per-dimension views to judge each factor yourself.
Troubleshooting
- Chart too busy? Unpin countries or use the radar’s Focus control.
- Ranking disagrees with your intuition? Compare the per-dimension scores; one dimension often drives the gap.
- A dimension looks thin? Its source may not be integrated yet.
Next in Global Analysis: Empire Rankings Overview and Reading the Big Cycle Chart.
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FAQ
Q: Whose framework is this based on?
A: Ray Dalio’s Changing World Order, adapted to open data.
Q: Can I change the weights?
A: Custom weighting is not currently available. The per-dimension views let you judge each factor yourself.