I. >> H  uman Rights and Indicators: Rationale and Some Concerns >> Human rights indicators - notion and rationale any kind of indicator that is expressed primarily in quantitative form, such as numbers, percentages or indices.17 Thus, indicators related to enrolment rates for school-age children, indicators on the number of ratifications of treaties, the time frame for implementation and coverage of policies relevant to human rights, the proportion of seats in the national parliament held by women, and the incidence of enforced or involuntary disappearance are all examples of quantitative indicators. At the same time, “checklists” or sets of questions, narrative and categorical data that seek to complement or elaborate on information—numerical or otherwise—related to the realization of human rights are also widely used. These checklists are seen as useful indicators of the situation being monitored or analysed. In such cases, the use of the word “indicator” refers to information beyond statistics that is qualitative in nature. Experts in many agencies in the United Nations system and within the human rights community have often favoured such an interpretation of the word indicator, implicitly emphasizing the qualitative aspect. These two main uses of the word “indicator” in the human rights community do not reflect two opposed approaches. Given the complexity of assessing compliance with human rights standards, all relevant qualitative and quantitative information is potentially useful. Quantitative indicators can facilitate qualitative evaluations by measuring the magnitude of certain events. Similarly, qualitative information can complement the interpretation of quantitative indicators. Similar complementarities can be highlighted between subjective and objective indicators. 2 Fact-based and judgement-based indicators Human rights indicators could also be categorized as fact-based and judgement-based indicators, which corresponds to the category of objective and subjective indicators in the literature on statistics and development indicators. This distinction is not necessarily based on the consideration of using, or not using, reliable or replicable methods of data collection for defining the indicators. Instead, it is ideally seen in terms of the information content of the indicators concerned. Thus, objects, facts or events that can, in principle, be directly observed or verified (for example, weight of children, number of violent deaths, nationality of a victim) are categorized as objective indicators. Indicators based on perceptions, opinions, assessment or judgements expressed by individuals are categorized as subjective indicators. In practice and in the context of certain human rights, this distinction between objective and subjective information is often difficult to make. Elements of subjectivity in the identified category of objective indicators cannot be fully excluded or isolated. The characterization of the nature of the information captured can in itself be seen as a subjective exercise. Nevertheless, the use of transparent, specific and universally recognized definitions for particular events, facts and objects contributes, in a general sense, to greater objectivity when identifying and designing any type of indicator, be it a quantitative, a qualitative, a subjective or an objective one. Moreover, fact-based or objective indicators, in contrast with judgement-based or subjective indicators, are verifiable and can be easier to interpret when comparing the human rights situation in a country over time and across populations. 17. The three expressions, namely quantitative, statistical or numerical indicators, are often used interchangeably. Human Rights Indicators 17