Research from the Reputation Institute reveals the UK takes 13th place and the US 22nd in a survey of 55 destinations (the largest by GDP).
The countries that are perceived best – and worst – by the rest of the world have been assessed according to issues relating to the economy, safety, the environment, natural landscape and government.
The ranking was formed from the opinions of 48,000 people from G8 nations, reflecting how much respect, trust and admiration they had for the countries in question.
What’s interesting is the most powerful and wealthy countries aren’t necessarily the most reputable, while those that are happiest, safest and least corrupt tend to be held in the highest regard.
Based on last year’s results, the most improved countries were Iran, China and India.
When it comes to internal reputations – what countries think of themselves – Australia was the most self confident, while Canada came second. In reality, they aren’t far off the truth.
Russia, meanwhile, was the least critical of itself, with a gap of 47.2 points out of 100 between its self image and that of other countries (0 being no difference).
Here are the top ten most reputable nations:
1. Canada
2. Norway
3. Sweden
4. Switzerland
5. Australia
6. Finland
7. New Zealand
8. Denmark
9. Netherlands
10. Belgium
These are the countries with the worst reputations: