Sovereign Risk Ratings are controversial measures used to determine a country’s creditworthiness. They are supposed to measure not only a country’s ability, but willingness to repay its debts. Much has been said about what it is that is actually measured by these ratings. But relatively little attention has been paid to who gets rated. That is, there is substantially less research on the issue of the when and the why a nation gets rated by one of the leading Credit Rating Agencies. The objective of this article is to try to understand that, and to sort through different theories for the emergence and spread of sovereign risk ratings. We find that institutional and political aspects matter just as much as economic ones, and that therefore sovereign risk ratings may play a role in political and social issues.

主权风险评级是用于确定一个国家信誉的有争议的措施。他们不仅应衡量一个国家的能力，而且还应衡量其偿还债务的意愿。关于这些评级实际衡量的是什么，已经有很多说法。但是，对谁进行评分的关注相对较少。就是说，关于何时以及为什么一个国家被领先的信用评级机构之一评级的问题的研究很少。本文的目的是试图理解这一点，并为主权风险等级的出现和扩散梳理不同的理论。我们发现，制度和政治方面与经济方面同样重要，因此主权风险等级可能在政治和社会问题中发挥作用。