Indicators as a Technology of Global Governance

Davis, Kevin E.; Kingsbury, Benedict; Merry, Sally Engle

doi:10.1111/j.1540-5893.2012.00473.x

Cited by 297 publications

(142 citation statements)

References 50 publications

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“…In spite of methodological concerns voiced by social scientists and statisticians alike (for example, Munda and Nardo ; Cherchye, Moesen, Rogge, and Van Puyenbroeck ; Klasen and Schüler ; Davis, Kingsbury, and Merry ), five of the nine indices rank order country's performance—UNDP's GII, OECD's SIGI, World Economic Forum's GGG, The Economist's WEO, and Social Watch's GEI. The other four abstain from giving countries a numerical rank (for example, 1–100) instead creating broad categories of measurement (high, moderate, low, for instance).…”

Section: Producing Gender Equality: Examining Nine Key Indicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gender Equality Oversimplified: Using CEDAW to Counter the Measurement Obsession

Liebowitz

Zwingel

2014

Int Stud Rev

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Global measurements have become foundational for understanding gender equality as well as for directing resources and policy development to address gendered inequalities. We argue in this article that attempts to quantify gender (in)equality globally have limited potential for successfully challenging gender hierarchies if compared to internationally agreed upon women's rights standards. To make this argument, we start by contrasting the general assumptions underlying the measurement approach with feminist scholarship on gender equality. Second, we examine nine key measures of global gender equality—the majority of which are produced by influential international organizations—and show that their focus on “countability” perpetuates a narrow and misleading understanding of gender (in)equality. Third, we present the CEDAW Convention and associated review process as an alternative to the measurement approach. The comparison highlights the need for evaluative tools that attend to the complexity and fluidity of gender norms and focus on context‐specific agency to confront gender hierarchies.

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Section: Producing Gender Equality: Examining Nine Key Indicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gender Equality Oversimplified: Using CEDAW to Counter the Measurement Obsession

Liebowitz

Zwingel

2014

Int Stud Rev

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“…Thirdly, stakeholders' participation is an opportunity to bypass a positivist paradigm of safety by preventing an oversimplified reduction of an organization's multidimensional vulnerability to a scalar quantity, which could mask the underlying causes of vulnerability and lead to useless results (see Rossignol, Delvenne, and Turcanu 2014). Indeed, measurements of vulnerability via indicators refer to a positivist tentative of 'quantification' of governance via the development of standardized indicators as an essential evolution in the incorporation of scientific information into good governance (Davis, Kingsbury, and Merry 2012). Such quantifications have been strongly criticized (e.g.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

“How are you vulnerable?”: Using participation for vulnerability analysis in emergency planning

Rossignol

Turcanu

Fallon

et al. 2014

Journal of Risk Research

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Scientists in many fields of research have developed models, theories, and concepts attempting to grasp and manage dangers that are often difficult to imagine. Among the different perspectives, the science and technology studies (STS) vulnerability approach seems very promising. Relying on a constructivist paradigm, it is based on an inductive collection and analysis of a wide range of factors, with a particular focus on cultural factors and actual day-to-day practices. In this paper, we present the roots of this approach and we display findings based on three case studies exploring emergency planning in three different contexts (a city near a SEVESO plant, a school near a nuclear plant, and a city confronted to multiple catastrophic scenarios). The cases studies were realized by conducting three Focus Groups with different types of stakeholders (citizens, teachers, firemen, decision-makers, etc.). After presenting the results of the case studies, we discuss how stakeholders' participation can inform such type of vulnerability analysis in the context of emergency planning. We argue that participation fosters a deep understanding of actual safety governance practices which allows innovative results to emerge as well as it initiates a learning process among the participants. It contributes to questioning the relations between decision-makers, experts, and citizens. It has the potential of bypassing the positivist and quantitative rationale of safety, and thus, of redefining the vulnerability governance. As a conclusion, we question the role of such STS vulnerability approach within the actual vulnerability governance.

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“…By using these data, researchers accept the definition of corruption that strips illicit economic practices of their contextual complexity (Davis et al 2012). For instance, TI's definition of corruption -"the abuse of entrusted power for private gain" (TI 2012) -presumes that interactions and exchanges, characterized as corrupt, happen within a Weberian rational-legal bureaucracy, characterized by a hierarchical division of labor and an unambiguous distinction between public and private spheres.…”

Section: Corruption Is a Deviationfrom A Rational-legal Bureaucratic mentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond Anti-Corruptionism: Sociological Imagination and Comparative Study of Corruption

Zaloznaya

2013

Comp Sociol

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This article outlines and illustrates a theoretical blueprint for comparative sociology of corruption. The author argues that existing cross-national studies of corruption, influenced by the global political movement for transparency, undermine fundamental sociological principles. At the same time, truly sociological studies of corruption are unfavorable to comparisons due to their emphasis on the singularity of exchange economies in non-Western societies. The author argues that there are three analytical foci that can help researchers resolve the tension between 'insensitive' large-N and 'overly-sensitive' small-N studies of corruption: the principle of social embeddedness, multiplicity of rationality, and localized pov/et implications. A comparative study of university corruption in Post-Soviet Ukraine and Belarus is used to illustrate the strengths of the proposed analytical framework.Currently, comparative study of corruption does not exist outside the politicized paradigm of international relations. Corruptology is permeated with inaccurate and profoundly non-sociological assumptions, adopted from anti-corruptionism -the transnational movement coordinated by •' I would like to thank Elizabeth Onasch, Terrence Halliday, Michael Sauder, Amy Myrick, anonymous reviewers, and attendees of Theory Workshop at the University of Iowa Sociology Department for their insightful comments on the drafts of this paper.

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Indicators as a Technology of Global Governance

Cited by 297 publications

References 50 publications

Gender Equality Oversimplified: Using CEDAW to Counter the Measurement Obsession

Gender Equality Oversimplified: Using CEDAW to Counter the Measurement Obsession

“How are you vulnerable?”: Using participation for vulnerability analysis in emergency planning

Beyond Anti-Corruptionism: Sociological Imagination and Comparative Study of Corruption

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