Ensuring a cross-cutting and systematic analysis to improve the safety image and the evaluation of public policies in this area

Observatory Methodological notes #2: Comparing countries, regions or cities in terms of security

09.04.2026

It is tempting to compare countries, regions or cities when studying security. 

Such comparisons are, however, complex and call for great caution. Based on the case of the Brussels-Capital Region (BCR), this note reviews the conditions required to enable methodologically rigorous comparisons (Sections 1 to 3) and discusses some existing indices and rankings as well as their limitations (Section 4). 

Download

Emergency calls

In Belgium, there are two main emergency numbers:

All emergency numbers

Follow us!