Chapter 2 GENERAL FRAMEWORKS AND APPROACHES
Document begins: Chapter 2 GENERAL FRAMEWORKS AND APPROACHES As noted previously, SA is a broad, still emerging area of policy thinking and experimentation. In this chapter, the focus is on organisational frameworks and approaches that have been used or are potentially available for assessment purposes. These can be divided into two main categories: · retrospective assessments of progress made by countries or sectors of activity towards, or away from, sustainable development; and · prospective assessments of the sustainability of proposed options, initiatives and actions. In both contexts, indicator-based approaches are particularly important for systematic analysis and considerable emphasis is given to them. 2.1 Retrospective approaches to measuring and analysing sustainability The purpose of measuring and analysing sustainability is to answer five questions: · How well is the ecosystem in question? · How are people affecting the ecosystem? · How well are the people (including current and future generations)? · Is their well-being fairly shared? · How are these questions connected? This information is essential for determining the progress of a society towards sustainability, its main strengths and weaknesses, and the priority issues to be addressed, eg by a national sustainable development strategy (NSDS). The information equips decision-makers to ...
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Available at https://www.iied.org/g02175