The Disunity of Consensus

Using the 1994 Cairo Conference on Population and Development as a case study, this paper challenges standard approaches to understanding political consensus. Neither cognitive, social, nor strategic, consensus can be rethought as a metaphor for ‘getting along’ within a structured disunity. Structure derives from commitment to a socio-technical network, while disunity arises from the interpretive flexibility and varied practices contained within this network. The Cairo Consensus is then explored through a central site of production: international demographic surveys. These surveys help to build a stable network, and thus facilitate consensus, by helping to establish epistemic communities, producing standard representations of Third World fertility, and standardizing political discourses of legitimacy and accountability.