Abstract
Multidimensional assessment of sustainability is a way to reconcile the need for simultaneous consideration of various indicators of progress beyond GDP growth with a policy focused visualization of multi-dimensional trends in a clear and transparent manner. The various composite measures used for sustainability assessment often hide the trade-offs between economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainability. This chapter discusses indicators used for sustainability analysis at the macro scale and offers a multi-criteria sustainability assessment framework. It discusses results that were obtained in sustainability assessments for the USA, Brazil, China, France, Germany, Britain and Russia. The Multicriteria Decision Aid tool, Aggregated Preference Index System (APIS) is used for the assessment with the following three headline indicators: GDP per capita; CO2 emissions and Life Expectancy at birth. The indicators represent economic, environmental and social dimensions respectively. The multidimensional assessment is designed with two different policy priorities: priority of economic over environmental and social dimension versus priority of environmental and social dimensions over economic. Results help to identify countries, where economic development happened at the expense of environmental and social dimension and lead to policy conclusions.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Anselin A, Meire PM, Anselin L (1989) Multi-criteria techniques in ecological evaluation: an example using the analytical hierarchy process. Biol Conserv 49(3):215–229
Castaneda B. (1999) An index of sustainable economic welfare (ISEW) for Chile. Ecol Econ 28:231–244
COM (2001) 264. 15.5.2001. Communication from the commission. ‘A Sustainable Europe for a Better World: A European Union Strategy for Sustainable Development’ (Commission’s proposal to the Gothenburg European Council). http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/site/en/com/2001/com2001_0264en01.pdf
EEA (1999) Environment in the European Union at the turn of the century
EEA (2003) Environmental indicators: typology and use in reporting
Encyclopaedia of the Earth (2006) Kyoto protocol and the United States. http://www.eoearth.org/view/article/154065/
Hovanov NV, Yudaeva M, Hovanov K (2009) Multicriteria estimation of probabilities on basis of expert non-numeric, non-exact and non-complete knowledge. Eur J Oper Res 195(3):857–863
Martinez-Alier J, Munda G, O’Neill J (1998) Weak comparability of values as a foundation for ecological economics. Ecol Econ 26:277–286
Max-Neef M (1995) Economic growth and quality of life: a threshold hypothesis. Ecol Econ 15:115–118
Munda G (1995) Multicriteria evaluation in a fuzzy environment. Theory and applications in ecological economics, Contributions to economics Series. Physica-Verlag, Heidelberg, 255 pp
OECD (1993) OECD core set of indicators for environmental performance reviews. A synthesis report by the group on the state of the environment. OECD, Paris, 35 pp.Polenske, K.R. & Lin, X., 1993. Conserving energy to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in China. Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, 4(2), pp.249–265.
Pisano U, Lepuschitz K, Berger G (2013) National sustainable development strategies in Europe 2013. Taking stock and exploring new developments. ESDN Q Rep 29:32
Rath-Nagel S, Stocks K (1982) Energy modelling for technology assessment: the MARKAL approach. Omega 10(5):493–505
Roy B (1985) Méthodologie multicritère d’aide à la décision. Economica, Paris, 699 pp
Roy B (1991) The outranking approach and the foundation of electre methods. Theor Decis 31:49–73
Roy B (1996) Multicriteria methodology for decision aiding. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, Boston, London, 293 pp
Roy B, Vincke P (1981) Multicriteria analysis: survey and new directions. Eur J Oper Res 8:207–218
Shmelev S (2010) Environmentally extended input–output analysis of the UK economy: key sector analysis
Shmelev S (2011) Dynamic sustainability assessment: the case of Russia in the period of transition (1985–2008). Ecol Econ 70(11):2039–2049
Shmelev S (2012) Ecological economics: sustainability in practice. Springer, Dordrecht, 248 pp
Shmelev SE, RodrÃguez-Labajos B (2009) Dynamic multidimensional assessment of sustainability at the macro level: the case of Austria. Ecol Econ 68(10):2560–2573
Shmelev SE, Shmeleva IA (2009) Sustainable cities: problems of integrated interdisciplinary research. Int J Sustain Dev 12(1):4–23
UN (1992) Agenda 21, Programme of action for sustainable development, adopted at the United Nations conference on environment and development, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 1992
UN (1996) United Nations, indicators of sustainable development framework and methodologies. United Nations Sales Publication No.E.96.II.A.16, New York, August 1996
UN (2007) Indicators of sustainable development, guidelines and methodologies, 3rd edn. United Nations Department for Economic and Social Affairs, Division for Sustainable Development, http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/csd/review.htm
UN (2012) Sustainable development goals. http://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/
UNEP (2007) GEO 4. Global environmental outlook report. http://www.unep.org/geo/GEO4/report/GEO-4_Report_Full_en.pdf
WCED (1987) Our common future. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 416 pp
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2017 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Shmelev, S. (2017). Multidimensional Assessment of Sustainability: Harmony vs. the Turning Point. In: Shmelev, S. (eds) Green Economy Reader. Studies in Ecological Economics, vol 6. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-38919-6_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-38919-6_5
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-38917-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-38919-6
eBook Packages: Earth and Environmental ScienceEarth and Environmental Science (R0)