From Calculative Idealism to Calculative Pragmatism – the Role of Quantified Knowledge in Constructing the EU Anti-Poverty Policy.

This paper aims to show how quantified knowledge, exemplified by metrics such as indicators and indices, contributes to the construction of EU anti-poverty policy. I argue that due to the limited legal instruments at the EU's disposal, metrics have become a key governance tool in this area, serving both to influence Member States (MS) policies and to reach compromises between EU actors representing different knowledge production regimes and interests. Drawing on in-depth interviews with EC and MS representatives, social and non-governmental partners and experts, I will illustrate how metrics are used to negotiate boundaries in this policy area, and to strengthen its supranational dimension. This is well reflected in the process of agreeing on key metrics, in which a compromise is forged between the EC, MS and other actors on what will be measured and what will be left out of the picture. Such 'commonly agreed' indicators and indices are then institutionalised as key elements of EU anti-poverty policy, legitimising this policy area as a sphere of common European concern, despite the fact that most legal prerogatives remain in the hands of MS. At the same time, those involved in negotiating metrics are aware of their shortcomings and political nature, which indicates a shift from calculative idealism - often presented in the literature as a source of legitimacy that numbers provide to politics - to calculative pragmatism, i.e. from a belief that numbers are purely technical and apolitical, to a recognition that they are imperfect and the result of trade-offs.