Lightning talk: “Historical Data Streams and Measuring Sustainability”
Short paper presented by Dulce van Vliet
11 October 2025
Abstract:
The process of datafication and quantification is central to the current effort to track sustainable development (Wickberg et al. 2024). But while digital technology might have ushered the current large scale datafication, data streams of different yet considerable sizes have existed for a very long time (Kaplan and Di Lenardo 2017). For instance, many national statistics offices were established in the late nineteenth century, formalizing former national accounting initiatives. This short talk explores how the wellbeing monitor, designed by the Dutch statistical office (CBS), can be used as a blueprint for historical research into sustainability trade-offs. To do so it is necessary to migrate, redocument and remap, historical statistics to fit the current information paradigm—the structure of the monitor—which is organized in dimensions, themes and indicators. The goal is to historicize the so-called wellbeing monitor “Weltanschauung” (Sörlin 2025) by creating a time-series that gives visibility to multiple parallel indicators and establishes contingencies between economic, natural, human and social developments.
Link to conference website: https://www.historyoftechnology.org/annual-meeting/2025-shot-annual-meeting/