The Sustainable Development Goals Confront the Infrastructure of Measurement

This brief article comments on the special issue on SDGs ‐ Knowledge and Politics in Setting and Measuring the SDGs. Acknowledging that the articles in the issue show how reliance on indicators changes the way development is conceived, Merry asks why is it so difficult to produce better indicators....

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Global policy 2019-01, Vol.10 (S1), p.146-148
Main Author: Merry, Sally Engle
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Indicators
Infrastructure
Sustainable development
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Summary:This brief article comments on the special issue on SDGs ‐ Knowledge and Politics in Setting and Measuring the SDGs. Acknowledging that the articles in the issue show how reliance on indicators changes the way development is conceived, Merry asks why is it so difficult to produce better indicators. If they are too narrow, why not simply produce more? She argues that conceiving of measurement as an infrastructure provides important insight into these questions. Measuring development is clearly an important strategy for promoting it, but it should not be the only one, particularly considering how it shapes what development means and how it is implemented. Such a heavy reliance on quantification ignores the constraints on accurate knowledge resulting from the infrastructure of measurement.
ISSN:1758-5880
1758-5899
DOI:10.1111/1758-5899.12606