ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at examples of the methods used by government to bolster its data resources. The first of these saw government conducting surveys of the people to gather new information. Here, the examples of the National Cohort Study and the General Household Survey are analysed. The discussion of the cohort study shows how it was set up in order to further biopolitical ends by establishing a benchmark standard of what constituted normal behaviour and establishes the lengths to which its founders contemplated going to get this data. The examination of the General Household Survey details the extent of its popularity across Whitehall and beyond, and how, like the cohort study, it was used to hone research methods and wear down confidentiality norms. Second, the chapter explores the increased use of data already held by government departments. This involved government in circumventing the existing confidentiality codes that ring-fenced data allowing it to be used only for the purpose for which it had been obtained, and commensurately, in increasingly standardising the format of data to facilitate the processes of linking it into a wider and deeper matrix.
