Regional Approval ratings

Toby Manhire at the Listener blogs:

The New Zealand prime minister ranks ninth in theGallup survey (see below) of leader approval ratings in 21 nations in the Asian region, with 72% saying they approved of Key’s job performance, 24% disapproving, and 4% confused or profoundly shy or something.

The survey by the Washington-based Gallup, which polled 1,000 people in each country, has attracted widespread coverage across the region, but as far as I can tell has been overlooked in New Zealand.

I only saw it myself thanks to the daily summary by Bryce Edwards. I was surprised that Key ranked only 9th, as I know his ratings are much higher than national leaders in the US, UK, Canada, France, Germany and Australia. But then I looked at the table:

Laos is a one party state. Cambodia has been ruled by the one party since independence as has Singapore. Sri Lanka is one of the most repressive regimes in the world for press freedom. Haven’t looked into details for Philippines, Malaysia, Bangladesh and Indonesia but I suspect in a fair few of those, criticising the head of state can be a risky thing to do 🙂

Would be interesting to see such a poll in say the OECD countries.