First International Statistical Congress
[1] It was principally organised by Belgian astronomer and statistician Adolphe Quetelet, who envisioned a standardisation of European units of measurement to allow for collaborative research to be done between nations.
As the World’s Fair attracted scholars from different parts of Europe, Prince Albert began the task of influencing public opinion favourably towards the standardisation of international statistics.
[4] One of these scholars was the Belgian astronomer and statistician Adolphe Quetelet, who became convinced of the necessity for an international congress to unify the various methods of statistical measurement across different nations.
[6] In doing so, this would not only create a sense of unity amongst European nations, but it would also greatly increase the efficacy of statistical-based research, allowing for bigger scientific initiatives to be taken in the hopes of improving living conditions across Europe.
Ferdinand Piercot, Belgium's Minister of the Interior, was elected as President of the Congress; William Farr of England, Louis-René Villermé of France, Karl Friedrich Wilhelm Dieterici of then-Prussia, Carl Mittermaier of then-Baden, Jan Akersdyck of the Netherlands, Ramón de la Sagra of Spain, Karl von Czoernig of Austria, and Bertini of Sardinia were named Vice-Presidents.
[9] Despite the Congress's emphasis on international collaboration, a great portion of the conference was first spent highlighting domestic statistics and measurement processes to gain a better understanding of how best to begin standardisation.
In France, statisticians were prompted to present misleading demographic statistics that would underestimate the population growth of the country as not to raise concerns among their European neighbours regarding the balance of power.
For agriculture specifically, censuses were designed to measure what and how much was produced, what farm equipment was used, and how many workers and animals were present; these took place once every ten years in the winter, after the annual harvests to ensure availability of farmers.
The Congress agreed that in order to record the most precise information possible using these agricultural censuses, it was necessary to conduct surveys simultaneously and collect the results through local Commissions, at which point a final table could be created and used for comparison against other states.
In terms of demographics and population, metrics like emigration and immigration were analysed based on origin, health condition, and number of people departing from and arriving at certain nations.
Additionally, personal information such as Indigenous status, language spoken, religion, place of birth, education level and profession, number of rooms in one’s house, and illnesses were also included in the census.
[18] To standardise physical terrain across nations to create uniformity, the Congress proposed a system of triangulation to measure distance for each country’s map if states were able to provide an adequate, acceptable one.
This was partly attributed to an overall lack of cohesive communication, an inability for the Congress to gather and verify data, and a growing tension in nationalist beliefs in states.
