And both Iraq and Iran badly trailed the third least-respected country, Pakistan.
The poll results punched a big hole in the claims of the Islamic Republic to be respected globally. However, the published results combined the responses in all countries and did not show how respected Iran was within the subset of the Islamic world.
The New York-based Reputation Institute takes the survey annually. This year it queried 42,000 people all around the world asking how much they trusted and admired 50 major countries.
Canada came out first, followed very closely by Sweden, Australia and Switzerland. All four Scandinavian countries queried about came out in the top eight. Three of the six English-speaking countries came out in the top five—Canada first, Australia third and New Zealand fifth—with Britain down in 15th place, Ireland in 17th and the United States trailing in 23rd place.
The poll included seven majority Muslim countries. They were all ranked in the bottom half—the UAE at 29th place, Turkey 36th, Egypt 37, Saudi Arabia 44th and Pakistan, Iran and Iraq as the bottom three.
Noticeably, no major power ranked high. The top 10 countries were all rich but minor players in international politics. The highest ranked major powers were Germany and Japan in 11th and 12th place respectively, and neither of them has thrown its weight around very much since World War II.
Of those countries that do try to throw their weight around, Britain ranked highest at 15th place, which is certain to displace the powers that be in Tehran, with Russia way down in 45th place.
Georges Trad of the Reputation Institute said, “The study shows that a strong country reputation requires a solid performance across three different areas: having an advanced econ-omy, an appealing environment and an effective government.”
Perhaps the most important finding, the institute said, is that reputation means money. The poll found a strong correlation between a country’s reputation and people’s willingness to visit there, buy its exported products and services, invest there, study there, and live and work there.
Kasper Nielsen of the Reputation Institute said, “When you consider that a 10 percent increase in your country’s reputation leads to an 11 percent increase in your tourism receipts and a 2 percent increase in your FDI [foreign direct investment], this is something both countries and companies might want to take note of.”