In general, countries that rank high in this index, are countries that "work well" with the 'community of nations'. Regardless how one may feel about that. In

In general, countries that rank high in this index, are countries that "work well" with the 'community of nations'. Regardless how one may feel about that. In my case (Dutch passport): the Netherlands is a member of many inter-governmental organizations, regarded as trustworthy & often working to advance common goals. Longtime stable democracy, financial & (mostly) functional legal system. And thus travellers carrying a Dutch passport are welcomed in many places. It's easy to see that for example socialist-leaning nations may not be 'liked' by the US (and vice versa, often for good reasons), and prefer to go their own way. I don't judge / have no beef with that. A sovereign state is just that. But net result may well be that such a country takes part in fewer trade agreements, is a member of fewer 'country communities', and has less-friendly relations with some other countries. And for example an assortment of African countries may be recovering from colonial history, or too busy with internal problems to focus much on international relations. Again: no judgement here. It is what it is. But these things are exactly what tends to produce lower rankings. Rub some countries the wrong way, and find your citizens are less welcome there.