The New Politics of Numbers
 | |
| Editors | Andrea Mennicken Robert Salais |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Subjects | Social statistics Politics |
| Publisher | Palgrave Macmillan |
Publication date | 2022 |
| Pages | 497 |
| ISBN | 978-3-03-078201-6 |
The New Politics of Numbers: Utopia, evidence and democracy is a multi-author book edited by sociologists Andrea Mennicken and Robert Salais and published in 2022 by Palgrave Macmillan.
Synopsis
[edit]This work builds on the 1989 volume The Politics of Numbers of William Alonso and Paul Starr,[1] as well as Alain Desrosières’ The Politics of Large Numbers, the contributions of Laurent Thévenot, and other scholars in France and the UK. The volume[2] sets out to investigate the power of statistics, how they travel across countries and domains, how they may be implicated in policy reform, and how they establish accountability and regulation.[3] The book devotes particular attention to the linkages between statistics and democracy.[4]
The book was inspired by a working group on social quantification at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin in 2014.[5] It is inspired by two strands of research: one related to Foucauldian ideas of power and control, which were studied by historians and sociologists at the London School of Economics; and the other being the "economics of conventions" or "theory of conventions", studied by various French scholars, including Luc Boltanski, Laurent Thévenot, and originally by Alain Desrosières.[5]
Content
[edit]Peter Miller's chapter investigates the role of statistics in design of health policies.[6] The role of quantification in international certification standards is discussed by Thévenot.[7] Uwe Vormbusch provides recounts the quantified self movement,[8] while Boris Samuel provides an example of Statactivism staged in French Guadeloupe.[9] Ota De Leonardis discusses how statistics permit a semantic shift in the meaning of inequality.[10] The book also contains chapters from other scholars such as Emmanuel Didier, Martine Mespoulet, Tom Lang, Corine Eyraud and others. Wendy Nelson Espeland writes the foreword "What Numbers Do".
Reception
[edit]Harro Maas writes that "it is just impossible to open a newspaper or news site without being reminded of the themes addressed in this volume" after having read the book.[5]
Related readings
[edit]- Alain Desrosières, The Politics of Large Numbers: a history of statistical reasoning, Harvard University Press (1998).
- Alonso, W., & Starr, P. (1989). The Politics of Numbers, Russell Sage Foundation.
- Bessy, C., & Didry, C. (Eds.). (2022). L’économie est une science réflexive, Chômage, convention et capacité dans l’œuvre de Robert Salais, Presses Universitaires du Septentrion.
- Theodore M. Porter, Trust in Numbers: The Pursuit of Objectivity in Science and Public Life, Princeton University Press, 1995.
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ Alonso, W., & Starr, P. (1989). The Politics of Numbers, Russell Sage Foundation.
- ^ Mennicken, Andrea; Salais, Robert, eds. (2022). The New Politics of Numbers. Springer Nature. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-78201-6. hdl:20.500.12657/50949. ISBN 978-3-030-78200-9.
- ^ Mennicken, Andrea; Salais, Robert (2022). "The New Politics of Numbers: An Introduction". The New Politics of Numbers. pp. 1–42. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-78201-6_1. ISBN 978-3-030-78200-9.
- ^ Salais, Robert (2022). ""La donnée n'est pas un donné": Statistics, Quantification and Democratic Choice". The New Politics of Numbers. pp. 379–415. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-78201-6_12. ISBN 978-3-030-78200-9.
- ^ a b c Maas, Harro (November 23, 2022). "The New Politics of Numbers: Utopia, Evidence and Democracy". Statistique et Société. 10 (2): 99–104. doi:10.4000/statsoc.523.
- ^ Miller, Peter (2022). "Afterword: Quantifying, Mediating and Intervening: The R Number and the Politics of Health in the Twenty-First Century". The New Politics of Numbers. pp. 465–476. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-78201-6_14. ISBN 978-3-030-78200-9.
- ^ Thévenot, Laurent (2022). "A New Calculable Global World in the Making: Governing Through Transnational Certification Standards". The New Politics of Numbers. pp. 197–252. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-78201-6_7. ISBN 978-3-030-78200-9.
- ^ Vormbusch, Uwe (2022). "Accounting for Who We Are and Could be: Inventing Taxonomies of the Self in an Age of Uncertainty". The New Politics of Numbers. pp. 97–134. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-78201-6_4. ISBN 978-3-030-78200-9.
- ^ Samuel, Boris (2022). "The Shifting Legitimacies of Price Measurements: Official Statistics and the Quantification of Pwofitasyon in the 2009 Social Struggle in Guadeloupe". The New Politics of Numbers. pp. 337–377. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-78201-6_11. ISBN 978-3-030-78200-9.
- ^ De Leonardis, Ota (2022). "Quantifying Inequality: From Contentious Politics to the Dream of an Indifferent Power". The New Politics of Numbers. pp. 135–166. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-78201-6_5. ISBN 978-3-030-78200-9.