Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
Support for democracy is widespread in the predominantly Muslim countries surveyed. Majorities or pluralities in the seven nations say democracy is preferable to any other kind of government, and many increasingly believe that a democratic government, rather than a strong leader, can best solve national problems. When asked to choose between a good democracy and […]
The image of the United States remains overwhelmingly negative in predominantly Muslim countries. U.S. favorability ratings are low in nearly all of the Muslim nations surveyed, and majorities or pluralities in all seven say the U.S. does not take the interests of countries like theirs into account when making foreign policy decisions. Moreover, many continue […]
To assess ideology, researchers measured three different elements of a site’s news content. They examined the range of viewpoints represented in each story in which the subject involved some matter of disagreement, conflict or controversy. They looked at the narrative frame of the story to see if it reflected one of a detailed list of […]
Muslim Americans constitute a population that is rare, dispersed, and diverse. It includes many recent immigrants from multiple countries with differing native tongues who may have difficulty completing a public opinion survey in English. The intense attention paid to Muslims in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks and increased attention to Islamic extremism may have […]
In most parts of the world, publics continue to express more confidence in U.S. President Barack Obama than in key European leaders tested in the survey. As in previous surveys, German Chancellor Angela Merkel is popular in European countries, but not well-known in the rest of the world. French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Russian President […]
On balance, extremist groups tend to receive negative ratings in the predominantly Muslim nations surveyed, although there are significant levels of support for these organizations in many countries. There is no country in which a majority has a favorable opinion of the militant Palestinian organization Hamas. Among Palestinians themselves, Hamas’ image has declined in recent […]