IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jpolmo/v47y2025i1p97-117.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Is there worldwide convergence toward the SDGs?

Author

Listed:
  • Bigerna, Simona
  • Micheli, Silvia

Abstract

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are an unprecedented guide to addressing sustainability challenges globally. A central issue in sustainable development debate is represented by the convergence problem. The aim of our paper is to construct a policy analysis model that can be used to examine the cross-country convergence processes with respect to the achievement of SDGs toward the goals, based on the theory of sigma-convergence and beta-convergence The analysis covers 190 countries from 2000 to 2022 and the convergence is estimated with both ordinary least square and Arellano-Bond methods. Factors affecting the multivariate convergence process are shown. Our analysis contributes to policy-shaping to redefine strategies that allows the SDGs to be achieved, highlighting the need to define concrete and measurable objectives, with qualitative and quantitative methods at national levels.

Suggested Citation

  • Bigerna, Simona & Micheli, Silvia, 2025. "Is there worldwide convergence toward the SDGs?," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 97-117.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jpolmo:v:47:y:2025:i:1:p:97-117
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jpolmod.2024.12.002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0161893824001522
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jpolmod.2024.12.002?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sala-i-Martin, Xavier X, 1996. "The Classical Approach to Convergence Analysis," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 106(437), pages 1019-1036, July.
    2. Young, Andrew T. & Higgins, Matthew J. & Levy, Daniel, 2008. "Sigma Convergence versus Beta Convergence: Evidence from U.S. County-Level Data," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 40(5), pages 1083-1093.
    3. Wodon, Quentin & Yitzhaki, Shlomo, 2006. "Convergence forward and backward?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 92(1), pages 47-51, July.
    4. Robert J. Barro, 1991. "Economic Growth in a Cross Section of Countries," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 106(2), pages 407-443.
    5. Maria Abreu & Henri L. F. de Groot & Raymond J. G. M. Florax, 2005. "A Meta‐Analysis of β‐Convergence: the Legendary 2%," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 19(3), pages 389-420, July.
    6. Lichtenberg, Frank R, 1994. "Testing the Convergence Hypothesis," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 76(3), pages 576-579, August.
    7. Kassouri, Yacouba & Okunlola, Oluyemi Adewole, 2022. "Analysis of spatio-temporal drivers and convergence characteristics of urban development in Africa," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).
    8. Karolis Andriuškevičius & Dalia Štreimikienė & Irena Alebaitė, 2022. "Convergence between Indicators for Measuring Sustainable Development and M&A Performance in the Energy Sector," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(16), pages 1-23, August.
    9. Robert M. Solow, 1956. "A Contribution to the Theory of Economic Growth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 70(1), pages 65-94.
    10. Galor, Oded, 1996. "Convergence? Inferences from Theoretical Models," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 106(437), pages 1056-1069, July.
    11. Urmas Varblane & Priit Vahter, 2005. "An Analysis Of The Economic Convergence Process In The Transition Countries," University of Tartu - Faculty of Economics and Business Administration Working Paper Series 37, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, University of Tartu (Estonia).
    12. Sharma, Gagan Deep & Tiwari, Aviral Kumar & Talan, Gaurav & Jain, Mansi, 2021. "Revisiting the sustainable versus conventional investment dilemma in COVID-19 times," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    13. Asadullah, M. Niaz & Savoia, Antonio, 2018. "Poverty reduction during 1990–2013: Did millennium development goals adoption and state capacity matter?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 70-82.
    14. James E. Payne, 2020. "The convergence of carbon dioxide emissions: a survey of the empirical literature," Journal of Economic Studies, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 47(7), pages 1757-1785, April.
    15. Michael Kremer & Jack Willis & Yang You, 2022. "Converging to Convergence," NBER Macroeconomics Annual, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(1), pages 337-412.
    16. Umar Shuaibu Aliyu & Huseyin Ozdeser & Behiye Çavuşoğlu & Mohammed A. M. Usman, 2021. "Food Security Sustainability: A Synthesis of the Current Concepts and Empirical Approaches for Meeting SDGs," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-25, October.
    17. Jesús Crespo Cuaresma & Wolfgang Fengler & Homi Kharas & Karim Bekhtiar & Michael Brottrager & Martin Hofer, 2018. "Will the Sustainable Development Goals be fulfilled? Assessing present and future global poverty," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 4(1), pages 1-8, December.
    18. Renato Camodeca & Alex Almici, 2021. "Digital Transformation and Convergence toward the 2030 Agenda’s Sustainability Development Goals: Evidence from Italian Listed Firms," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-18, October.
    19. Robert J. Barro & Xavier Sala-i-Martin, 1991. "Convergence across States and Regions," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 22(1), pages 107-182.
    20. Zhang, Shikun & Anser, Muhammad Khalid & Yao-Ping Peng, Michael & Chen, Chunchun, 2023. "Visualizing the sustainable development goals and natural resource utilization for green economic recovery after COVID-19 pandemic," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    21. Quah, Danny T., 1996. "Empirics for economic growth and convergence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 40(6), pages 1353-1375, June.
    22. Yixuan Peng & Sayed Fayaz Ahmad & Ahmad Y. A. Bani Ahmad & Mustafa S. Al Shaikh & Mohammad Khalaf Daoud & Fuad Mohammed Hussein Alhamdi, 2023. "Riding the Waves of Artificial Intelligence in Advancing Accounting and Its Implications for Sustainable Development Goals," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(19), pages 1-12, September.
    23. Williamson, Jeffrey G., 1996. "Globalization, Convergence, and History," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 56(2), pages 277-306, June.
    24. Pereira, Miguel Alves & Camanho, Ana Santos & Marques, Rui Cunha & Figueira, José Rui, 2021. "The convergence of the World Health Organization Member States regarding the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal ‘Good health and well-being’," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    25. Chambers, Dustin & Dhongde, Shatakshee, 2016. "Convergence in income distributions: Evidence from a panel of countries," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 262-270.
    26. Higgins, Matthew J. & Levy, Daniel & Young, Andrew T., 2006. "Growth and Convergence across the United States: Evidence from County-Level Data," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 88(4), pages 671-681.
    27. Manuel Arellano & Stephen Bond, 1991. "Some Tests of Specification for Panel Data: Monte Carlo Evidence and an Application to Employment Equations," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 58(2), pages 277-297.
    28. Herrerias, M.J., 2013. "The environmental convergence hypothesis: Carbon dioxide emissions according to the source of energy," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 1140-1150.
    29. Zbigniew Matkowski & Mariusz Próchniak, 2007. "Economic Convergence Between the CEE-8 and the European Union," Eastern European Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(1), pages 59-76, February.
    30. Barro, Robert J & Sala-i-Martin, Xavier, 1992. "Convergence," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(2), pages 223-251, April.
    31. Pahle, Michael & Schaeffer, Roberto & Pachauri, Shonali & Eom, Jiyong & Awasthy, Aayushi & Chen, Wenying & Di Maria, Corrado & Jiang, Kejun & He, Chenmin & Portugal-Pereira, Joana & Safonov, George & , 2021. "The crucial role of complementarity, transparency and adaptability for designing energy policies for sustainable development," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 159(C).
    32. Kinnunen, Maarit & Wood, Emma H. & Li, Yanning & Moss, Jonathan, 2022. "Self-recorded conversations in tourism memory research," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 96(C).
    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. Stephen Dobson & Carlyn Ramlogan & Eric Strobl, 2006. "Why Do Rates Of Β‐Convergence Differ? A Meta‐Regression Analysis," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 53(2), pages 153-173, May.
    2. Paul Johnson & Chris Papageorgiou, 2020. "What Remains of Cross-Country Convergence?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 58(1), pages 129-175, March.
    3. Tang, Pan & Zhang, Ying & Baaquie, Belal E. & Podobnik, Boris, 2016. "Classical convergence versus Zipf rank approach: Evidence from China’s local-level data," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 443(C), pages 246-253.
    4. Robert Stimson & Roger R. Stough & Peter Nijkamp (ed.), 2011. "Endogenous Regional Development," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 14154, December.
    5. Ronny Correa-Quezada & Lucía Cueva-Rodríguez & José Álvarez-García & María de la Cruz del Río-Rama, 2020. "Application of the Kernel Density Function for the Analysis of Regional Growth and Convergence in the Service Sector through Productivity," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 8(8), pages 1-20, July.
    6. Roberta Capello & Peter Nijkamp, 2011. "Regional Growth and Development Theories Revisited," Chapters, in: Robert Stimson & Roger R. Stough & Peter Nijkamp (ed.), Endogenous Regional Development, chapter 15, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    7. Llorca, Manuel & Rodriguez-Alvarez, Ana, 2024. "Economic, environmental, and energy equity convergence: Evidence of a multi-speed Europe?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 219(C).
    8. Dimitar Eftimoski, 2020. "Some new insights on economic convergence and growth in Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 47(4), pages 863-884, November.
    9. Durlauf, Steven N. & Quah, Danny T., 1999. "The new empirics of economic growth," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & M. Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 4, pages 235-308, Elsevier.
    10. Feng Li & Guangdong Li & Weishan Qin & Jing Qin & Haitao Ma, 2018. "Identifying Economic Growth Convergence Clubs and Their Influencing Factors in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(8), pages 1-21, July.
    11. Soukiazis, Elias & Antunes, Micaela, 2011. "Is foreign trade important for regional growth? Empirical evidence from Portugal," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 1363-1373, May.
    12. Rubiane Daniele Cardoso Almeida & Philipp Ehrl & Tito Belchior Silva Moreira, 2021. "Social and Economic Convergence Across Brazilian States Between 1990 and 2010," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 157(1), pages 225-246, August.
    13. Antonin Bergeaud & Gilbert Cette & Rémy Lecat, 2020. "Convergence of GDP per capita in advanced countries over the twentieth century," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 59(5), pages 2509-2526, November.
    14. Grafström, Jonas, 2017. "An Econometric Analysis of Divergence of Renewable Energy Invention Efforts in Europe," Ratio Working Papers 295, The Ratio Institute.
    15. Tunali, Çiǧdem Börke & Yilanci, Veli, 2010. "Are per capita incomes of MENA countries converging or diverging?," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 389(21), pages 4855-4862.
    16. Kutub Uddin & Zohurul Anis & Muhammad Jakir Hossain & Zohurul Islam Shamol, 2016. "Examining Convergence in Per Capita Agricultural Production across Selected Asian countries," International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, Human Resource Management Academic Research Society, International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, vol. 6(10), pages 178-194, October.
    17. Cristina D. Checherita, 2009. "Variations on economic convergence: The case of the United States," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 88(2), pages 259-278, June.
    18. Eftychia Tsanana & Constantinos Katrakilidis, 2014. "Do Balkan economies catch up with EU? New evidence from panel unit root analysis," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 41(4), pages 641-662, November.
    19. Seonyoung Park & Donggyun Shin, 2023. "Recent changes in the nature of the distribution dynamics of the US county incomes," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 38(7), pages 1048-1067, November.
    20. Ageliki Anagnostou & Dimitris Kallioras & Christos Kollias, 2016. "Governance Convergence Among the EU28?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 129(1), pages 133-146, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    multivariate convergences; sustainable development goals; policy analysis model;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C33 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Models with Panel Data; Spatio-temporal Models
    • Q43 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - Energy and the Macroeconomy
    • O11 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
    • O13 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Agriculture; Natural Resources; Environment; Other Primary Products
    • R11 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:eee:jpolmo:v:47:y:2025:i:1:p:97-117. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/505735 .

    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.