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Government policy documents across 185 countries largely cite Global North sources
Sebastian Ramirez-Ruiz1,2, Roman Senninger3
1Departments of Political and Social Sciences, European University Institute (EUI), Fiesole, Italy. sebastian.ramirezruiz@eui.eu.
Nature Human Behaviour
|May 7, 2026
Summary
Global policy decisions heavily rely on evidence, yet most foreign sources cited, even by Global South governments, originate from the Global North. This highlights significant global knowledge asymmetries in policymaking.
Area of Science:
- Social Sciences
- Policy Studies
- Information Science
Background:
- Evidence is crucial for effective public policy formulation.
- Understanding the specific sources informing global policy decisions remains limited.
Purpose of the Study:
- To explore and map the sources of evidence used in global policymaking.
- To analyze citation patterns in policy documents worldwide.
Main Methods:
- Analysis of over 1.2 million policy documents from 185 countries.
- Examination of 3.5 million scholarly works and 740,000 policy sources cited.
- Mapping global citation practices, regional variations, and policy domain differences.
Main Results:
- A significant concentration of cited evidence originates from the Global North, even in Global South policy documents.
- This pattern is consistent across various policy domains, with some variation in source types.
- The international policy knowledge ecosystem exhibits persistent asymmetries in visibility, access, and influence.
Conclusions:
- The global evidence landscape for policymaking is highly concentrated.
- A small number of countries disproportionately act as global reference points.
- Addressing these asymmetries is key to a more equitable international policy knowledge ecosystem.
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