Facts, Figures, and the Politics of Measurement

This chapter examines the work involved in constructing remittances as a financial flow. The power dynamics and politics of expertise involved in recent controversies over remittances data—its measurement, compilation, and representation—are explored. The chapter examines the work of a small number of policy entrepreneurs within a handful of international financial institutions, development agencies, and think tanks—the work that went into the design and spread of particular data-collection techniques and representational practices. Particular attention is placed on these actors’ deployment of the soft power available to them as officials in reputable international agencies as they sought to standardize remittances data across the Latin American region.