The Force of Comparison

In an era defined by daily polls, institutional rankings, and other forms of social quantification, it can be easy to forget that comparison has a long historical lineage. Presenting a range of multidisciplinary perspectives, this volume investigates the concepts and practices of comparison from the early modern period to the present. Each chapter demonstrates how comparison has helped to drive the seemingly irresistible dynamism of the modern world, exploring how comparatively minded assessors determine their units of analysis, the criteria they select or ignore, and just who it is that makes use of these comparisons—and to what ends.

In an era defined by daily polls, institutional rankings, and other forms of social quantification, it can be easy to forget that comparison has a long historical lineage. Presenting a range of multidisciplinary perspectives, this volume investigates the concepts and practices of comparison from the early modern period to the present. Each chapter demonstrates how comparison has helped to drive the seemingly irresistible dynamism of the modern world, exploring how comparatively minded assessors determine their units of analysis, the criteria they select or ignore, and just who it is that makes use of these comparisons—and to what ends.

List of Figures and Tables

Introduction: Concepts and Practices of Comparison in Modern History
Willibald Steinmetz

Chapter 1. Outlines of a Historical Epistemology of Comparison: From Descartes to the Early Nineteenth Century
Michael Eggers

Chapter 2. Comparative Practices and their Implications: The Case of Comparative Viewing
Johannes Grave

Chapter 3. Above/Below, Better/Worse, or Simply Different? Metamorphoses of Social Comparison, 1600–1900
Willibald Steinmetz

Chapter 4. Empowering Comparisons? The Making of Republics in the Early Modern Period
Lars Behrisch

Chapter 5. Comparing Europe and the Americas: The Dispute of the New World between the Sixteenth and Nineteenth Centuries
Angelika Epple

Chapter 6. European Colonial Empires and Victorian Imperial Exceptionalism
Alex Middleton

Chapter 7. Comparison and the Welfare State in Modern Europe, c. 1880–1945
Julia Moses

Chapter 8. Comparison, Rivalry and Competition under Neo-Liberalism and State Socialism
David Priestland

Chapter 9. Comparing Economic Activities on a Global Level in the 1920s and 1930s: Motives and Consequences
Martin Bemmann

Chapter 10. In Search of A Global Centre of Calculation: The Washington Statistical Conferences of 1947
Daniel Speich Chassé

Chapter 11. Formalized Comparisons: Rankings and Status in Higher Education
Wendy Espeland

Chapter 12. Good – Better – Best: The Power of Ranking Orders
Bettina Heintz

Index