An Analysis Of The Data Revolution For The UN 2030 Agenda

As a global development action plan,The United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda(2030 Agenda)is the successor of the Millennium Development Goals(MDG).Facing problems like unsatisfactory implementation review and a low completion rate due to shortage of data,MDG gives important lessons to 2030 Agenda on emphasizing monitoring,evaluation and follow-up review.Moreover,the 2030 Agenda called for a “data revolution” for sustainable development,aiming to provide policy-makers and monitors with reliable data.The importance of data revolution lies not only in improving statistical capacity,bridging data gaps and guiding development policies,but also in realizing follow-up review of all indicators,promoting implementation and government accountability.Hence the data revolution is not primarily focused on data,but on changing political tradition in international development.Moreover,data revolution suspends disputes over aid ineffectiveness and aid conditionality between donors and recipient countries,as well as introduces scientific ways to examine and solve the problem of development inefficiency.While recognizing data revolution's value and importance,neglecting its political risks could be dangerous.This article applied the theory of “scientization of politics”,analyzed the background and logic of data revolution,and discussed the risks of data revolution for sustainable development.First,data revolution aims to promote development accountability,while the existing data gaps could hardly support a balanced and equal accountability system.Then all punishment for ineffective aid is likely to be imposed on the bottom people in recipient countries.Second,data revolution stresses data credit,but a loss of data sovereignty could only leads to passive acceptance of rules and standards.Third,data revolution calls for openness.While openness becomes a standard for civilization,the gaps of data could grow into the gaps of civilization.So if improperly applied,data revolution will face the dysfunction of“scientization of politics”,namely,the results of data revolution could be anything but promoting global sustainable development.In the end,after retrospecting the history of data construction in China,the article tries to give policy advice on China's participating into the data revolution,especially on how to promote a reasonable,equal and balanced revolution,as well as to build a global data partnership.