Security through numbers? Experimentally assessing the impact of numerical arguments in security communication

AuthorStephane J Baele,Travis G Coan,Olivier C Sterck
Published date01 May 2018
Date01 May 2018
DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1177/1369148117734791
Subject MatterOriginal Articles
https://doi.org/10.1177/1369148117734791
The British Journal of Politics and
International Relations
2018, Vol. 20(2) 459 –476
© The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/1369148117734791
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Security through numbers?
Experimentally assessing the
impact of numerical
arguments in security
communication
Stephane J Baele1, Travis G Coan2
and Olivier C Sterck3
Abstract
Numerical arguments are increasingly present in security communication and are widely assumed
to possess a distinct capacity to make an argument convincing, thereby contributing to the dynamics
of securitization. Yet, does the inclusion of numbers really enhance the strength of rhetorical
attempts to convince an audience that something or someone is a security problem? We examine
this question by developing an experimental design that connects cognitive theories of information
processing with theories of security and risk communication. Contrary to a widely shared view,
our results suggest that numbers do not have a direct, unambiguous, or unconditional impact
on the strength of security rhetoric. Quantitative information only enhances direct attempts to
securitize issues under very specific circumstances and, even in these cases, has ambiguous effects.
Factors such as the legitimacy of the individual who makes the argument may play an important
role in determining the impact of numbers in security communication.
Keywords
argumentation, experimental methods, framing, numbers, persuasion, rhetoric, securitization,
security
Introduction: Challenging ‘numerical determinacy’ in
security communication
Numbers enjoy a privileged status in contemporary society. Quantitative data, indicators,
rankings and charts not only saturate our environment, but are also ubiquitous in politics,
where numbers drive negotiations, evidence-based policy making, and regulation.
1Centre for Advanced International Studies, Department of Politics, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK
2Department of Politics and Q-Step Centre, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK
3Refugee Studies Centre, Department of International Development, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
Corresponding author:
Stephane J Baele, Centre for Advanced International Studies, Department of Politics, University of Exeter,
Amory Building, Rennes Drive, Exeter EX4 4QJ, UK.
Email: s.baele@exeter.ac.uk
734791BPI0010.1177/1369148117734791The British Journal of Politics and International RelationsBaele et al.
research-article2017
Original Article
460 The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 20(2)
Following this trend, numbers now feature prominently in politics in general (e.g. bench-
marking practices, numbers-based regulation), and more specifically in political leaders’
communication to the public and peers on potential security problems (e.g. migration,
pandemics). Quantitative rhetoric is regularly employed to convince an audience that a
security problem is important, that a new threat is emerging or that an issue or group con-
stitutes a potential security problem and therefore must be monitored more closely or
addressed more vigorously. For instance, consider the following quotes on drugs, migra-
tion, and HIV/AIDS, respectively:
90% of the heroin in Europe comes from poppies grown in Afghanistan—where the drugs trade
pays for private armies. Most of it is distributed through Balkan criminal networks which are
also responsible for some 200,000 of the 700,000 women victims of the sex trade worldwide.
(EU Security Strategy, 2013)
Let me recall what is currently being done: foreigners’ naturalizations are maximized (plus
14%), regularizations are encouraged (plus 51% due to the Valls bill), and expulsions are
diminished (minus 26,6%)—altogether, this produces a 7% increase in legal immigration, which
means in concrete terms that every year more than 300,000 people arrive, an amount equivalent
of the population of the city of Nantes. (French MEP Brice Hortefeux, quoted in Le Monde,
2014)1
Every hour of the day, almost 600 people are infected by HIV/AIDS. (UN Secretary General
Kofi Annan, in his 2001 World AIDS Day speech)
We focus on this argumentative use of numbers in security communication, examining
the commonly held assumption of political actors that is defended by many scholars in the
‘quantification of politics’ literature2: that political arguments today are less convincing
absent numbers. However, by chiefly focusing on the causes (historical, sociological, organi-
zational) and effects (e.g. compliance, gaming, resistance, standardized behaviours) of the
increasing use of numbers in politics, this literature has largely taken for granted the power
of numbers in argumentation and communication, assuming that numbers are de facto more
persuasive or have ‘distinctive properties’ (Hansen and Porter, 2012: 421), and that as a con-
sequence, powerful political arguments are now required to contain numbers, as qualitative
arguments progressively become discounted. For example, documenting the pressure on UN
officials to quantify their arguments on international migration governance, Breant emphati-
cally calls numbers the most important ‘rhetorical weapons’ of our times (Breant, 2012: 156).
Similarly, in her analysis of EU expertise, Boswell argues that statistics are now an increas-
ingly ‘important rhetorical device’ (Boswell, 2009: 89), while Conley (2004) claims that
quantitative reports and communication on globalization were instrumental in successfully
promoting 1990s liberal economic policies among Australians. Baele et al. (2017) explain
the initial success of the human security agenda by its promoters’ massive use of numbers in
communication, and Molle and Mollinga (2003: 537) claim that providing a ‘gloss of scienti-
ficity’ to a political message has become crucial in its success, especially when the issue at
stake has a nonconsensual character. Broome and Quirk (2015: 813) concur, arguing that
numbers convert ‘what might otherwise be highly contentious normative agendas […] into
formats that gain credibility through rhetorical claims to neutral and technocratic assess-
ment’. Taking for granted the power of numbers in political argumentation seems to be a
deeply entrenched reflex: as Saulnier (2012: 22) observes, Diderot already warned in his
Encyclopedia against the seducing power of ‘political arithmetics’. However, to our

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