Abstract
So far, the elementary question of whether one country’s or region’s economy is moving towards sustainability or away from it cannot be answered with unanimous consensus on the ‘measuring rod(s)’ to be employed. The main assumption of this article is that sustainability assessment needs a set of multi-dimensional indicators. From this assumption a question arises: how could such indicators be aggregated? Often, some indicators improve while others deteriorate. For instance, when incomes grow, SO2 might go down while CO2 increases. It has to be noted that this is the classical conflictual situation studied in multi-criteria decision theory. The use of a multi-criterion framework for making operational the ‘measuring of sustainability’ is discussed here by means of illustrative examples and more formal arguments.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
T.F.H. Allen J.A. Tainter T.W. Hoekstra (2002) Supply-Side Sustainability Columbia University Press New York.
K.J. Arrow H. Raynaud (1986) Social Choice and Multicriterion Decision Making M.I.T Press Cambridge.
E.B. Barbier A. Markandya (1990) ArticleTitleThe conditions for achieving environmentally sustainable growth European Economic Review. 34 659–669 Occurrence Handle10.1016/0014-2921(90)90138-O
G. Barbiroli (1993) Direct and indirect indicators of sustainable development Proceedings of the International Conference on Environmental Pollution Barcelona 489–496
E. Beinat P. Nijkamp (1998) Multicriteria Evaluation in Land-Use Management: Methodologies and Case Studies Kluwer Academic Publishers Dordrecht.
G. Chichilnisky (1996) ArticleTitleAn axiomatic approach to sustainable development Social Choice and Welfare. 13 IssueID2 219–248
H.E. Daly J.J. Cobb (1989) For the Common Good: Redirecting the Economy Toward Community, the Environment and a Sustainable Future Beacon Press Boston.
S. Faucheux M. O’Connor (1998) Valuation for Sustainable Development: Methods and Policy Indicators Edward Elgar Cheltenham.
S.O. Funtowicz J.R. Ravetz (1990) Uncertainty and Quality in Science for Policy Kluwer Academic Publishers Dordrecht.
S.O. Funtowicz G. Munda M. Paruccini (1990) ArticleTitleThe aggregation of environmental data using multicriteria methods Environmetrics. 1 IssueID4 353–368
S.O. Funtowicz J.R. Ravetz (1994) ArticleTitleThe worth of a songbird: Ecological economics as a post-normal science Ecological Economics. 10 197–207 Occurrence Handle10.1016/0921-8009(94)90108-2
Funtowicz, S., Martinez-Alier, J., Munda, G. and Ravetz, J. (1999). ‘Information tools for environmental policy under conditions of complexity’). European Environmental Agency, Experts’ Corner, Environmental Issues Series, No. 9.
S.O. Funtowicz J. Martinez-Alier G. Munda J. Ravetz (2002) Multicriteria-based environmental policy H. Abaza A. Baranzini (Eds) Implementing Sustainable Development. UNEP/Edward Elgar Cheltenham 53–77
M. Giampietro (1994) ArticleTitleUsing hierarchy theory to explore the concept of sustainable development Futures. 26 IssueID6 616–625 Occurrence Handle10.1016/0016-3287(94)90033-7
M. Giampietro K. Mayumi (2000a) ArticleTitleMultiple-scale integrated assessment of societal metabolism: Introducing the approach Population and Environment. 22 IssueID2 109–154 Occurrence Handle10.1023/A:1026691623300
M. Giampietro K. Mayumi (2000b) ArticleTitleMultiple-scale integrated assessment of societal metabolism: Integrating biophysical and economic representations across scales Population and Environment. 22 IssueID2 155–210 Occurrence Handle10.1023/A:1026643707370
R. Horwarth R.B. Norgaard (1990) ArticleTitleIntergenerational resource rights, efficiency and social optimality Land Economics. 66 1–11
R. Horwarth R.B. Norgaard (1992) ArticleTitleEnvironmental valuation under sustainable development American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings. 80 473–477
J. Kacprzyk M. Roubens (1988) Non-Conventional Preference Relations in Decision Making Springer-Verlag Heidelberg.
G. Munda (1995) Multicriteria Evaluation in a Fuzzy Environment, Series: Contributions to economics Physica-Verlag Heidelberg.
G. Munda (1997a) ArticleTitleEnvironmental economics, ecological economics and the concept of sustainable development Environmental Values. 6 IssueID2 213–233
G. Munda (1997b) Multicriteria evaluation as a multidimensional approach to welfare measurement J. Bergh Particlevan den J. Straaten Particlevan der (Eds) Economy and Ecosystems in Change: Analytical and Historical Approaches. Edward Elgar Cheltenham 96–115
Munda, G. and Nardo, M. (2003). On the methodological foundations of composite indicators for ranking countries’). Proceedings of the First OECD/JRC Workshop on Composite Indicators of Country Performance, Ispra, JRC, available at http://webfarm.jrc.cec.eu.int/uasa/events/oecd_12 may 03/background/.
Munda, G. (2004). Social multi-criteria evaluation (SMCE)’: Methodological foundations and operational consequences, European Journal of Operational Research.
Munda, G. (forthcoming) ‘A NAIADE based approach for sustainability benchmarking. International Journal of Environment Technology and Management.
I. Musu D. Siniscalco (1996) National Accounts and the Environment Kluwer Academic Publishers Dordrecht.
OECD: 2003, Composite Indicators of Country Performance: A Critical Assessment, DST/IND(2003)5, Paris.
D.W. Pearce G.D. Atkinson (1993) ArticleTitleCapital theory and the measurement of sustainable development: An indicator of ‘weak’ sustainability Ecological Economics. 8 103–108 Occurrence Handle10.1016/0921-8009(93)90039-9
D. Pearce G. Hamilton G.D. Atkinson (1996) ArticleTitleMeasuring sustainable development: Progress on indicators Environment and Development Economics. 1 85–101
V.V. Podinovskii (1994) ArticleTitleCriteria importance theory Mathematical Social Sciences. 27 237–252 Occurrence Handle10.1016/0165-4896(93)00737-F
F.S. Roberts (1979) Measurement Theory with Applications to Decision Making, Utility and the Social Sciences Addison-Wesley London.
B. Roy (1996) Multicriteria Methodology for Decision Analysis Kluwer Academic Publishers Dordrecht.
M. Saisana S. Tarantola (2002) State-of-the-art report on current methodologies and practices for composite indicator development, EUR 20408 EN, Report European Commission JRC Ispra, Italy
H.A. Simon (1976) From Substantive to procedural rationality J.S. Latsis (Eds) Methods and Appraisal in Economics. Cambridge University Press Cambridge
F. Schmidt-Bleek (1994) Wieviel umwelt braucht der mensch? MIPS Das Mass für ökologisches wirtschaften Birkh user Berlin.
Urban Indicators Programme, http://www.urbanobservatory.org/indicators/database.
P. Vitousek P. Ehrlich A. Ehrlich P. Matson (1986) ArticleTitleHuman appropriation of the products of photosynthesis Bioscience. 34 IssueID6 368–373
M. Wackernagel W.E. Rees (1995) Our Ecological Footprint: Reducing Human Impact on the Earth New Society Publishers Gabriola Island, BC and Philadelphia, PA
P.L. Yu (1985) Multi Criteria Decision Making: Concepts, Techniques and Extensions Plenum Press New York.
J.A. Yusuf S. El Serafy E. Lutz (1989) Environmental Accounting for Sustainable Development A UNEP World Bank Symposium Washington D.C.
L.A. Zadeh (1965) ArticleTitleFuzzy sets Information and Control. 8 338–353 Occurrence Handle10.1016/S0019-9958(65)90241-X
M. Zeleny (1982) Multiple Criteria Decision Making McGraw Hill New York.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Munda, G. “Measuring Sustainability”: A Multi-Criterion Framework. Environ Dev Sustain 7, 117–134 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-003-4713-0
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-003-4713-0