By Festus Poquie
Global Rule of Law Index 2025 Finds Liberia’s Judiciary Eroding as Civic Liberties Shrink: Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Assembly and Civic Participation all Declined in 2025.
Liberia recorded a marginal improvement in the World Justice Project’s 2025 Rule of Law Index but the country shows worrying signs of democratic backsliding, with judges losing ground to executive outreach and rising political interference coinciding with shrinking civil liberties.
The WJP report, which compares rule-of-law performance across 143 countries, places Liberia 108th globally and 16th out of 34 countries in Sub Saharan Africa.
Liberia’s overall score rose by less than 1 percent in 2025, making it one of a minority of countries to register any gain in a year when the global rule-of-law recession accelerated — 68 percent of countries declined in the Index, up from 57 percent the prior year.
Beneath that modest improvement, however, the Index highlights a range of structural weaknesses. Liberia is among more than 70% of countries worldwide experiencing a contraction in civic space: “freedom of opinion and expression,” “freedom of assembly and association,” and “civic participation” all declined in 2025 — trends the WJP links to expanding authoritarianism.
The Index also signals a weakening of checks and balances in Liberia. Across the report, indicators that measure whether the judiciary effectively limits executive power and whether civil and criminal justice are free from improper government influence weakened in a majority of countries — and Liberia is specifically cited among those backsliding.
The WJP ties those patterns to rising executive overreach and political interference in justice systems.
Factor-level rankings underline the areas of concern. Liberia’s scores show particular fragility in corruption control and justice delivery: Absence of Corruption ranks 122nd globally; Civil Justice ranks 119th; Criminal Justice ranks 112th. Constraints on Government Powers sits at 78th globally, while Open Government and Fundamental Rights are ranked 85th and 79th, respectively — all signaling limited institutional protection against encroaching executive authority.
The Index also documents practical consequences for ordinary citizens. A global weakening of civil justice reported by the WJP — reflected in longer delays, fewer effective alternatives to courts, and greater government interference — is echoed in Liberia’s low rankings for civil and regulatory enforcement.
Regionally, the report situates Liberia amid a mixed picture for Sub-Saharan Africa: 25 of the region’s 34 measured jurisdictions declined over the year, even as Africa produced four of the top ten global improvers. Among low-income countries, Liberia ranks fifth out of 16.
The World Justice Project’s Rule of Law Index draws on more than 215,000 household surveys and 4,100 practitioner and expert surveys to measure performance across 44 subfactors.
