Beyond measure

Numbers reveal, but they also hide; they tell us who we are, but also who we ought to become; they show us how happy and healthy we are, but also urge us to adjust ourselves to the norm. Numbers manage us and we, in turn, manage ourselves through numbers. At the same time, the rationale behind these metrics remains inaccessible to us, stored safely away in a locket, kept secret from all but the few who have access to these systems of enumeration and computation. In our special issue, we open up this locket and explore questions around measurement in relation to management, organization, and politics –namely, how do processes of quantification intervene in our lives, sideline other modes of judgement and decision, and lead us astray with a trail of numbers. The title oft he special issue, ‘Beyond measure’, signals an attempt to denaturalize measurement, to peel back the layers of commensuration to see what lies beneath.