The Geopolitics of Measurement

1
The Geopolitics of Measurement
2

• Measurement is often taken for granted
• Measurements are taken, then analysis is
  possible....

3

• 1
• Measuring does not merely describe or represent
  what objects or processes are...
• ....it creates new objects, transforming reality
• See I Hacking, Representing and Intervening, CUP
  (1983), I Stengers, Power and Invention,
  Minnesota, B Latour, Pandoras Hope, Harvard
  (1999)

4

• 2
• The development of forms and systems of
  measurement are closely related to the
  development of politics and government
• see e.g. P Miller and N Rose, Governing the
  Present, Polity 2008

5

• 3
• The development of systems of measurement
  creates new (political) spaces...
• or Metrological zones
• see A Barry, Technological Zones, European
  Journal of Social Theory, 9, 2, 239-253

6

• 4
• Measurement is of critical importance to
  geopolitics..
• It has geopolitical and economic
  consequences.....

7

• 3 cases
• The metre and the French revolution
• Air quality on the High Street and the European
  Union
• The oil barrel and the geopolitics of capitalism

8
1. The metre (1790)
9
a. Standardisation

• Ce nest pas le , mais les systèmes de
  mesure et cest bien là le problème. Chaque
  région de France possède son propre système
  each region of France possesses its own system
  en Bretagne, on mesure en perches, à Marseille en
  palmes, à Paris en pieds ailleurs encore en
  toises, en pouces, en lignes, en brasses, en
  coudées, en empans, Il en est de même pour les
  mesures de masse où la livre est par exemple plus
  légère à Toulouse quà Strasbourg !!! the pound
  is lighter in Toulouse than Strasbourg
• See K Alder, Engineering the Revolution, 1997
  M Norton Wise (ed) The Values of Precision, 1995

10
But....

• Resistance to metrication in France (and later
  the UK)...
• A standardised measure based on nature (on a
  fraction of the earths meridian) rather than on
  human/cultural dimensions (the length of an arm,
  the size of a bottle)

11

• Progressive extension of the application of
  metric measurement (metrological zone) to
  create a unified and standardised space (the
  nation state)

12
2. Air Quality (December 1952)
13
Air quality monitoring networks

• E.g The London air quality network, Oxford air
  watch, national network
• Automatic and semi-automatic
• SOx, NOx, PM10, O3....
• See http//www.oxford-airwatch.aeat.co.uk/

14
Sites of measurement....

• Measures points
• Pollution can vary considerably with location
• not the same as human exposure (High St what
  about Longwall St!)
• Abstraction (from the complexity of the site) and
  the creation of a new object (air quality)
  which has effects

15

• Linked to targets....(and therefore actions by
  local authorities).. following National air
  quality strategy (1997) leads to action at a
  distance e.g. less polluting buses, pedestrian
  zones
• Public information but what does it mean? a
  reassuring realism (Myerson and Rydin) of
  environmental information expected to affect
  individual behaviour but how?
• On action at a distance see Bruno Latour, Science
  in Action, 1987

16
A European space of measurement?

• Different standards methods in different
  states...
• measurements in different states are comparable
  but different..
• Europe is a harmonised but not standardised
  metrological zone a network of measuring
  devices

17
3. Peak Oil (2008)
18
Peak oil

• - Predictions of when oil will start to run out
  based on calculations of proven reserves

19
Oil Reserves

• But...
• Oil companies only routinely quote proven
  reserves

• BP has cut 2.4pc off its proven reserves,
  becoming the latest oil and gas company to
  announce a significant revision of its asset
  holdings.
• The news follows Shell's shock statement in
  January that it had overestimated its proven
  reserves of oil and gas by 20pc, or 3.9billion
  barrels
• Daily Telegraph, 1 February 2009

20

• ..and proven oil reserves are not physical
  objects!
• Accounts of proven reserves represent what a
  company knows that it can economically produce
  given current technology and current prices....

21

• ...implies that proven reserves can fall as the
  price falls...
• ....and rise as a given oil field is
  progressively used up (as the company knows more
  precisely how much it can produce)
• ...

22
Virtual objects and the geopolitics of capitalism

• Proven oil reserves are not physical objects
  but economic relations
• Knowledge of proven oil reserves in major
  territories e.g. Iraq, Saudi Arabia is limited
  or inaccurate anyway...

23
Conclusions

• there is a political geography to measurement
• measurement does not just represent the world
  it transforms it and adds to it
• there are clear links between forms of
  measurement and the organisation of political and
  economic space (nation-states, transnational
  political organisations, multinational
  capital).....