US places No. 85 -- behind Libya -- in Global Peace Index

Still, he cautions, growing prosperity does not necessarily equate with a rising peace index: Russia has experienced some impressive (though not necessarily equitable) economic growth in recent years, but remains near the bottom of the GPI (No. 143) after a recent downturn, conflict with Georgia, and internal violence concerning Chechnya.

Nor do all countries respond poorly to adverse economic straits. In one of the earliest surveys, Iceland was No. 1, only to fall to No. 4 last year after the country’s financial meltdown led to upheaval and political instability. But this year Iceland rose again, now placing second behind New Zealand.

The GPI’s goal is to demonstrate that simple priorities lead to peace. “Education is a driver of peacefulness,” McConaghy says. “Not so much the quality of education or how much is spent, but just keeping kids in school.”

The GPI also confirms a trend recently noted by other tabulations of world conflicts: While cross-border wars and armed disputes have decreased in recent years, the number of internal conflicts such as civil wars has increased.

Many Americans may be suspicious of any peace index that has their country behind Nicaragua and Rwanda, McConaghy acknowledges. But he reminds observers that gauging peacefulness is not the same as ranking national well-being or happiness, as some surveys do. “Ours is not an airy definition” of peace, but a “technical definition – it’s not a state of mind,” he says.

Why, then, is America’s contribution to the security of other countries not calculated as a plus for peace? McConaghy acknowledges as a “good point” that US troops in South Korea may have stopped North Korea from invading, for example. But, he says, such judgments would push the GPI into making subjective calls.

“We find it almost impossible to judge which troop deployments are right and which are wrong,” he says. “Russian troops in South Ossetia – is that right or wrong? Someone from South Ossetia might very well insist it’s right.”

The US “is an example of a country with complex issues to face,” he says. “So given that, it gets a pretty good score.”

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• Burma tops 'worst of the worst' list of human rights violators

IN PICTURES: The most and least peaceful nations in the world

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