to become better at the indicator that they propose.
So in other words, governments seek to improve their ranking
in order to enhance competitiveness to attract foreign investors, and
to increase their status and legitimacy in the world.
The rankings in other words provide a benchmark for policymaking.
So governments implement policies that they believe are going to increase their
standing in the raking.
The governments also seek to optimize the indicators included in
the ranking playing strategically to try to get higher scores.
As a result, there is this isomorphic pressure.
Everybody's trying to do the same thing, trying to increase their standing in
the rankings, and this of course produces institutional convergence.
Let me give you an example of this.
Since the year 2003, the different,
the differences in the world across countries have become smaller and
smaller in terms of for example, the time spent preparing and paying taxes,
the time required to start a business or the cost to start a business.
And this is been because, governments have realized that unless they reduce the time
that people spent preparing or paying for their taxes, or the time
that entrepreneurs spend trying to set up their business and get it up and running.
Unless they cut those times by simplifying procedures by making it easier, then their
country is not going to score very high on international rankings of good governance.