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European Quality of Government Index

This index focuses on both perceptions and experiences with public sector corruption, along with the extent to which citizens believe various public sector services are impartially allocated and of good quality in the EU.

CITATION

When using the 2024 EQI data, make sure to cite:

Nicholas Charron, Victor Lapuente and Monika Bauhr (2024). “The Geography of Quality of Government in Europe. Subnational variations in the 2024 European Quality of Government Index and Comparisons with Previous Rounds”. QoG Working Paper Series 2024:2. Department of Political Science, University of Gothenburg. ISSN: 1653-8919.

When using the 2021 EQI data, make sure to cite:

Charron, Nicholas, Victor Lapuente, Monika Bauhr & Paola Annoni (2022) Change and Continuity in Quality of Government: Trends in subnational quality of government in EU member states. Investigaciones Regionales-Journal of Regional Research, 2022(53), 5-23. DOI: 10.38191/iirr-jorr.22.008

When using the 2017 EQI data, make sure to cite:

Charron, Nicholas, Victor Lapuente & Paola Annoni (2019) Measuring Quality of Government in EU Regions Across Space and Time, Papers in Regional Science. DOI: 10.1111/pirs.12437

When using the 2013 EQI data, make sure to cite:

Charron, Nicholas, Lewis Dijkstra & Victor Lapuente (2015) Mapping the regional divide in Europe: A measure for assessing quality of government in 206 European regions. Social indicators research, 122(2), 315-346. DOI: 10.1007/s11205-014-0702-y

When using the 2010 EQI data, make sure to cite:

Charron, Nicholas, Lewis Dijkstra & Victor Lapuente (2014) Regional Governance Matters: Quality of Government within European Union Member States, Regional Studies, 48 (1): 68-90. DOI:10.1080/00343404.2013.770141

The European Quality of Government Index (EQI) is the result of novel survey data regional (e.g. sub-national) level governance within the EU. The data was first gathered and published in 2010 and then repeated in 2013, 2017, 2021 and 2024. The index is based on a large citizen survey where respondents are asked about perceptions and experiences with public sector corruption, along with the extent to which citizens believe various public sector services are impartially allocated and of good quality.

It is the first source of data to date that allows researchers to compare QoG within and across countries in a multi-country context. It aims to provide researchers and policymakers a tool to better understand how governance varies within countries and now, over time.

It covers all 27 EU member states, the UK before Brexit and two accession countries (Serbia and Turkey are also included in the 2013 round). The sub-national regions are at the NUTS 1 or NUTS 2 level, depending on the country. Currently, we provide data for up to 206 regions, depending on the year in question. In the four waves of the EQI survey, we have roughly 330,000 respondents in total. Due to Brexit, regional data from 2010, 2013 and 2017 have been retrospectively updated with the new data releases in 2021 and 2024, and older versions of datasets can be found in our Data Archive.

Here, we provide both the regional level data, as well as the underlying microdata free of charge for researchers and practitioners interested in regional governance in Europe. In addition to the time-series regional dataset, where we keep a common sample of regions over the four waves, we provide a full NUTS 2, 2021 EQI data as well for 238 regions in the European Union. Please note that due to standardization, these estimates will be slightly different than the ones provided in the time series data for the year 2024, yet the rank order of regions within countries will not be affected.

In the EQI CATI country level dataset, for purposes of comparison of the country estimates over time, we include only telephone (CATI) respondents in the aggregation from the micro to country level, which means the online sample from 2021 and 2024 is not used in these calculations.