Global benchmarking by international organizations

What is it about?

Benchmarks now pervade many aspects of everyday life in a growing number of countries, and often distort processes of performance assessment and the strategic priorities pursued by leaders and managers in sectors ranging from healthcare to aid spending to university teaching and research. This article examines benchmarks of foreign investment regulations and the business environment for small and medium-sized firms, and demonstrates how global benchmarking by international organisations has become a significant source of indirect power in world politics.

Featured Image

Why is it important?

The Global Benchmarking Project in the Centre for the Study of Globalisation and Regionalisation at the University of Warwick has catalogued 275 instances of global benchmarks that aim to comparatively assess national performance in world politics, which can distort policymaking and political priorities at the global level and how national governments set official objectives and evaluate progress relative to their peers. This article shows how these contemporary dynamics play out in the World Bank and International Finance Corporation's controversial Ease of Doing Business ranking as well as the less prominent FDI Regulatory Restrictiveness Index produced by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The findings suggest that the use of benchmarking to alter how national policy officials understand best practices, advocate policy changes, and attribute political responsibility constitutes ‘bad science’, which nonetheless has a significant degree of legitimacy and influence as a result of the expert status enjoyed by these international organisations.

Perspectives