The Tyranny of Metrics

This was a very weird read. On the surface level, this provides an okay summary of all the issues with metricification and how a narrow focus on the quantitatively measurable has lots of unintended consequences.

What I wasn't prepared for [my bad for not having read the author's bio beforehand] was the extremely conservative point from which the author approaches the question. In an outright bizarre final chapter, the author argues against transparency outright and somehow manages to mix in Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning (who the author ofc deadnames…) as examples of how metrics and transparency are bad? Because somehow non-quantified civil/human rights violations done in the dark are better?

An okay collection of examples of how metrics backfire, but I'm sure there's books doing the same without the right wing baggage.

Metrics are used everywhere and you must have encountered (or have been evaluated on) some quirky or even stupid ones. This book attacks this almost religious view a lot of us have on metrics and question their so-called objectivity, highlighting a lot of cases where metrics provoked really bad impacts (from keeping patients artificially alive to ensure they last enough days to not count toward one to refusing to believe rape victims to avoid increasing a sector's crimes number). It's a great wake up call asking us to reflect on how usage of metrics, when and how to use them and to bring back our power of judgment and qualitative analysis in the face of the sacred numbers.

A truly must read for anyone nowadays I would say.