The Difficulty of Measuring Governance and Stateness

Abstract

Measures of governance and stateness have grown substantially in number over recent decade, and gained also greater importance in building public discourses and orienting decision-making processes. Yet there seems to be little agreement on what exactly these measures represent. This paper claims that the proliferation of metrics can only be understood against the conceptual hybridity and indeterminacy in which the notions of governance and stateness have entangled. To frame this ‘creative disorder’, the first part of the paper introduces the current debate on measuring governance and stateness. The second explores the sematic fields of the two concepts, while the third one provides an overview on existing measures and methodological questions. The fourth part explores normative demands and policy prescriptions linked to this production and the fifth section analyses in depth three different measures: The Rule of Law Index, the Sustainable Governance Indicators and the State Fragility Index. The sixth part concludes by summarising the relevance of exploring both conceptual and normative challenges in the use and production of these measures.