Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) has developed a self-assessment tool to measure government performance in a global economy. The tool's 87 questions look at the government policies and services that determine how attractive and how efficient a country will be as a location for companies in a global supply chain. The questions, which we divided into six categories*, range from how many days it takes to move a container across the border to measures of workforce health and education and the effectiveness of courts.

According to csis, the tool compares country scores to benchmarks - international best practices that show how a nation's performance compares to top global performers when it comes to global business - and can be used to identify strengths and areas for improvement. The survey uses benchmarks based on aggregate scores for three sets of countries that perform well in the global economy:

• OECD: The leading market economies.
• Big Five: The largest trading economies - the U.S., UK, Germany, Japan, and China.
• Exemplars: Countries that consistently outperform others in the global economy - Singapore, Switzerland, Finland, the Netherlands, and Ireland.

To test the self-assessment tool, CSIS recently used China as a trial case. One way to look at the results we found is that for an economic powerhouse, China still has a lot of room for improvement. Another way to look at it, however, is that as China improves its governmental processes and services, its businesses will become even more formidable competitors.

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