The article investigates how and when the two first movers in knowledge-based regulation -- the OECD and the World Bank -- developed policy brokerage as an instrument of global governance in the education sector. We also examine how their target clientele -- national governments -- responds to this instrument. Given the surplus of research evidence in today's digital economy, intergovernmental organisations have the challenge of standing out as trusted and credible knowledge brokers in a crowded space. The authors make the case for a comparative research programme -- tentatively labeled 'Governance by Numbers 2.0' -- that is informed by a multidisciplinary (history, political science, interdisciplinary policy studies) interpretive framework and that advances a transnational, relational method of inquiry which draws attention to the global/national nexus.