Datafication in education governance has become established in recent decades as the prime mode of knowing and reforming education systems around the world. The more data becomes the dominant mode of governing education systems, the more willing countries are to participate in the processes of collecting statistical data and governing by comparison. One of these global education monitoring exercises is the construction of the Education 2030 agenda, or Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG4). Education 2030 represents the single biggest attempt to bring together a vast array of actors and countries in order to construct universal indicators for assessing and improving education, as well as to decide on the appropriate methodologies and data sources necessary to measure them. It is a country-led, global exercise, steered by UNESCO but with the collaboration and close involvement of all major International Organisations (IOs). Given its global and collaborative scope, it confronts its leaders and participants with technical but also political challenges. Through an in-depth analysis of texts and interviews, this paper will discuss the conundrum of securing accountability of this global performance monitoring project through ensuring the objective validity of its measurement tools, whilst promoting the democratic and equal participation of all actors. As the custodian agency of SDG4, UNESCO has a double accountability obligation to participating countries: first, the robust and objective monitoring of progress towards the SDG4 goals, and secondly, the participatory and democratic, equitable process in which all member countries have a voice and stake in the project. As this paper will show, this double responsibility does not always happen without friction; on the contrary, it has been causing a significant amount of tension in the relationship between and within some of the major IOs, as well as between IOs and other stakeholders including developing nations. This paper enquires into the tension between technocratic legitimacy and political legitimation, by grappling with the question of how expertise and trust in objectivity can be maintained in political processes that aspire to greater inclusion. How do the processes of indicator development change as they are increasingly subject to democracy and transparency demands? Which compromises are needed in order to reconcile international and national data sources relying on different sources of expertise? Ultimately, how can we theorise on the relationship of elite, expert, technocratic objectivity-making with the inclusive, participatory and ever-expanding process of making consensus?

King, K. (2017). Lost in translation? The challenge of translating the global education goal and targets into global indicators. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education, 47(6), 801–817 Maroy C. & Pons, X. (2019) Introduction. In C. Maroy & X. Pons (Eds.), Accountability Policies in Education: A Comparative and Multilevel Analysis in France and Quebec, (pp. 1–12). Cham, Switzerland: Springer.