IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ulb/ulbeco/2013-189410.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Sustainability assessment and indicators: Tools in a decision-making strategy for sustainable development

Author

Listed:
  • Tom Waas
  • Jean Huge
  • Thomas BLOCK
  • Tarah Wright
  • Francisco Javier Benitez Capistros
  • Aviel Verbruggen

Abstract

Recognizing the urgent need for sustainability, we argue that to move beyond the rhetoric and to actually realize sustainable development, it must be considered as a decision-making strategy. We demonstrate that sustainability assessment and sustainability indicators can be powerful decision-supporting tools that foster sustainable development by addressing three sustainability decision-making challenges: interpretation, information-structuring, and influence. Particularly, since the 1990s many substantial and often promising sustainability assessment and sustainability indicators efforts are made. However, better practices and a broader shared understanding are still required. We aim to contribute to that objective by adopting a theoretical perspective that frames SA and SI in the context of sustainable development as a decision-making strategy and that introduces both fields along several essential aspects in a structured and comparable manner. © 2014 by the authors.

Suggested Citation

  • Tom Waas & Jean Huge & Thomas BLOCK & Tarah Wright & Francisco Javier Benitez Capistros & Aviel Verbruggen, 2014. "Sustainability assessment and indicators: Tools in a decision-making strategy for sustainable development," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/189410, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    • Handle: RePEc:ulb:ulbeco:2013/189410
    Note: SCOPUS: re.j
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://dipot.ulb.ac.be/dspace/bitstream/2013/189410/3/doi_173037.pdf
    File Function: Full text for the whole work, or for a work part
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bohringer, Christoph & Jochem, Patrick E.P., 2007. "Measuring the immeasurable -- A survey of sustainability indices," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(1), pages 1-8, June.
    2. Rennings, Klaus & Wiggering, Hubert, 1997. "Steps towards indicators of sustainable development: Linking economic and ecological concepts," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 25-36, January.
    3. Sneddon, Chris & Howarth, Richard B. & Norgaard, Richard B., 2006. "Sustainable development in a post-Brundtland world," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 253-268, May.
    4. Robinson, John, 2004. "Squaring the circle? Some thoughts on the idea of sustainable development," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(4), pages 369-384, April.
    5. Giuseppe Munda, 2016. "Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis and Sustainable Development," International Series in Operations Research & Management Science, in: Salvatore Greco & Matthias Ehrgott & José Rui Figueira (ed.), Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis, edition 2, chapter 0, pages 1235-1267, Springer.
    6. Yingxu Wang & Guenther Ruhe, 2007. "The Cognitive Process of Decision Making," International Journal of Cognitive Informatics and Natural Intelligence (IJCINI), IGI Global, vol. 1(2), pages 73-85, April.
    7. Wang, Jiang-Jiang & Jing, You-Yin & Zhang, Chun-Fa & Zhao, Jun-Hong, 2009. "Review on multi-criteria decision analysis aid in sustainable energy decision-making," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 13(9), pages 2263-2278, December.
    8. Hugé, Jean & Waas, Tom & Eggermont, Gilbert & Verbruggen, Aviel, 2011. "Impact assessment for a sustainable energy future'Reflections and practical experiences," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(10), pages 6243-6253, October.
    9. JosÉ Figueira & Salvatore Greco & Matthias Ehrogott, 2005. "Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis: State of the Art Surveys," International Series in Operations Research and Management Science, Springer, number 978-0-387-23081-8, September.
    10. Van de Kerk, Geurt & Manuel, Arthur R., 2008. "A comprehensive index for a sustainable society: The SSI -- the Sustainable Society Index," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 228-242, June.
    11. Julia Hertin & John Turnpenny & Andrew Jordan & Mans Nilsson & Duncan Russel & Björn Nykvist, 2009. "Rationalising the Policy Mess? Ex Ante Policy Assessment and the Utilisation of Knowledge in the Policy Process," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 41(5), pages 1185-1200, May.
    12. Katie Steele & Yohay Carmel & Jean Cross & Chris Wilcox, 2009. "Uses and Misuses of Multicriteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) in Environmental Decision Making," Risk Analysis, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 29(1), pages 26-33, January.
    13. Dias, Luis C. & Domingues, Ana Rita, 2014. "On multi-criteria sustainability assessment: Spider-gram surface and dependence biases," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 159-163.
    14. Reed, Mark S. & Fraser, Evan D.G. & Dougill, Andrew J., 2006. "An adaptive learning process for developing and applying sustainability indicators with local communities," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(4), pages 406-418, October.
    15. Jean Hugé & Tom Waas, 2011. "Converging impact assessment discourses for sustainable development: the case of Flanders, Belgium," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 13(3), pages 607-626, June.
    16. Ness, Barry & Urbel-Piirsalu, Evelin & Anderberg, Stefan & Olsson, Lennart, 2007. "Categorising tools for sustainability assessment," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(3), pages 498-508, January.
    17. Hezri, Adnan A. & Dovers, Stephen R., 2006. "Sustainability indicators, policy and governance: Issues for ecological economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(1), pages 86-99, November.
    18. Nuno Quental & Júlia M. Lourenço & Fernando Nunes da Silva, 2011. "Sustainable development policy: goals, targets and political cycles," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 19(1), pages 15-29, January/F.
    19. Bebbington, Jan & Brown, Judy & Frame, Bob, 2007. "Accounting technologies and sustainability assessment models," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(2-3), pages 224-236, March.
    20. Simon Bell & Stephen Morse, 2014. "Groups and Indicators in Post‐Industrial Society," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(3), pages 145-157, May.
    21. Markku Lehtonen, 2008. "Mainstreaming sustainable development in the OECD through indicators and peer reviews," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 16(4), pages 241-250.
    22. Sabrina Krank & Holger Wallbaum & Adrienne Grêt‐Regamey, 2013. "Perceived contribution of indicator systems to sustainable development in developing countries," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 21(1), pages 18-29, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Tom Waas & Jean Hugé & Thomas Block & Tarah Wright & Francisco Benitez-Capistros & Aviel Verbruggen, 2014. "Sustainability Assessment and Indicators: Tools in a Decision-Making Strategy for Sustainable Development," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 6(9), pages 1-23, August.
    2. Jean Hugé & Nibedita Mukherjee & Camille Fertel & Jean-Philippe Waaub & Thomas Block & Tom Waas & Nico Koedam & Farid Dahdouh-Guebas, 2015. "Conceptualizing the Effectiveness of Sustainability Assessment in Development Cooperation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(5), pages 1-17, May.
    3. Allain, S. & Plumecocq, G. & Leenhardt, D., 2018. "Spatial aggregation of indicators in sustainability assessments: Descriptive and normative claims," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 577-588.
    4. Mario Martín-Gamboa & Luis C. Dias & Paula Quinteiro & Fausto Freire & Luís Arroja & Ana Cláudia Dias, 2019. "Multi-Criteria and Life Cycle Assessment of Wood-Based Bioenergy Alternatives for Residential Heating: A Sustainability Analysis," Energies, MDPI, vol. 12(22), pages 1-17, November.
    5. Martín Alejandro Iribarnegaray & María Laura Gatto D’Andrea & María Soledad Rodriguez-Alvarez & María Eugenia Hernández & Christian Brannstrom & Lucas Seghezzo, 2015. "From Indicators to Policies: Open Sustainability Assessment in the Water and Sanitation Sector," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(11), pages 1-21, October.
    6. Liam Magee & Andy Scerri & Paul James & James Thom & Lin Padgham & Sarah Hickmott & Hepu Deng & Felicity Cahill, 2013. "Reframing social sustainability reporting: towards an engaged approach," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 15(1), pages 225-243, February.
    7. Bompard, E.F. & Corgnati, S.P. & Grosso, D. & Huang, T. & Mietti, G. & Profumo, F., 2022. "Multidimensional assessment of the energy sustainability and carbon pricing impacts along the Belt and Road Initiative," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    8. Frame, Bob & Brown, Judy, 2008. "Developing post-normal technologies for sustainability," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(2), pages 225-241, April.
    9. Castellani, V. & Sala, S., 2010. "Sustainable performance index for tourism policy development," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 871-880.
    10. Henriques, C. Oliveira & Antunes, C. Henggeler, 2012. "Interactions of economic growth, energy consumption and the environment in the context of the crisis – A study with uncertain data," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 415-422.
    11. Matthew Cohen, 2017. "A Systematic Review of Urban Sustainability Assessment Literature," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(11), pages 1-16, November.
    12. Parajuli, Ranjan & Dalgaard, Tommy & Jørgensen, Uffe & Adamsen, Anders Peter S. & Knudsen, Marie Trydeman & Birkved, Morten & Gylling, Morten & Schjørring, Jan Kofod, 2015. "Biorefining in the prevailing energy and materials crisis: a review of sustainable pathways for biorefinery value chains and sustainability assessment methodologies," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 244-263.
    13. Naim Hamdia Afgan, 2010. "Sustainability Paradigm: Intelligent Energy System," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 2(12), pages 1-19, December.
    14. Samir Mili & Javier Martínez-Vega, 2019. "Accounting for Regional Heterogeneity of Agricultural Sustainability in Spain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(2), pages 1-20, January.
    15. Phillis, Yannis A. & Grigoroudis, Evangelos & Kouikoglou, Vassilis S., 2011. "Sustainability ranking and improvement of countries," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(3), pages 542-553, January.
    16. Gengyuan Liu & Mark T. Brown & Marco Casazza, 2017. "Enhancing the Sustainability Narrative through a Deeper Understanding of Sustainable Development Indicators," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(6), pages 1-19, June.
    17. Brennan Lowery & John Dagevos & Ratana Chuenpagdee & Kelly Vodden, 2020. "Storytelling for sustainable development in rural communities: An alternative approach," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(6), pages 1813-1826, November.
    18. Iván Franchi-Arzola & Javier Martin-Vide & Cristián Henríquez, 2018. "Sustainability Assessment in Development Planning in Sub-National Territories: Regional Development Strategies in Chile," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(5), pages 1-30, May.
    19. Miguel Rodríguez-Rosa & Isabel Gallego-Álvarez & Mª Purificación Vicente-Galindo & Mª Purificación Galindo-Villardón, 2017. "Are Social, Economic and Environmental Well-Being Equally Important in all Countries Around the World? A Study by Income Levels," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 131(2), pages 543-565, March.
    20. Tom Waas & Jean Hugé & Aviel Verbruggen & Tarah Wright, 2011. "Sustainable Development: A Bird’s Eye View," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 3(10), pages 1-25, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ulb:ulbeco:2013/189410. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Benoit Pauwels (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ecsulbe.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.