Together with APCO, Horizon Group launched the Global Bureaucracy Perception Index (GBPI) at the World Governments Summit 2026. The index is a first-of-its-kind cross-country benchmark that measures how citizens and businesses actually experience bureaucracy.
Dr Margareta Drzeniek, Managing Partner, Horizon Group; Margery Kraus, Founder and Executive Chairman, APCO; HE Mohamed Bin Taliah, Chief of Government Services, UAE
A different kind of governance index
The GBPI gives citizens and businesses a measurable voice in how bureaucracy performs by measuring how users feel. It is a critical tool for governments aiming to turn service reform from aspiration into evidence.
Spanning 13 countries, 11 high-frequency services, and more than 5,800 respondents, the GBPI assesses bureaucracy across five dimensions that matter at the point of service:
- Transparency: The clarity of service requirements and procedures.
- Time: The total elapsed time to complete a service, including waiting, processing, and follow-up.
- Affordability: The financial and non-financial cost of completing a service, including fees and reliance on intermediaries.
- Predictability: The consistency and reliability of timelines, steps, and outcomes relative to what is communicated.
- Accessibility: The ease with which users can find, initiate, and complete services through available channels.
High-level results
- Governments are judged on delivery, not intent. Speed and reliability now define how users perceive public administration.
- Two effective service models are emerging: rapid centralized execution on one hand, and transparency-anchored, rule-consistent assurance on the other. The best-performing systems combine both.
- Citizens and businesses face different friction points. For citizens, the central barrier is accessibility, finding and completing services through workable channels. For businesses, it is cost and complexity, with procedural burdens routinely requiring professional intermediaries.
- AI is already present in service journeys, with strong public appetite for broader adoption — contingent on clear safeguards and visibility.
3 Things leaders can do next
- Standardize frontline delivery to raise Predictability (same rules, same sequencing, consistent exception handling across channels/offices).
- Cut end-to-end Time by preventing avoidable back-and-forth (clear “complete submission” standards, earlier eligibility/document checks, one consolidated clarification round).
- Design Accessibility as journey usability (clear “start here” routing, integrated digital/physical touchpoints, and visible case status).
