Measuring sustainable development: progress on indicators

David W. Pearce, Kirk Hamilton and Giles Atkinson

Environment and Development Economics, 1996, vol. 1, issue 01, pages 85-101

Abstract: The search for sustainability indicators should be guided by a theory of sustainable development (SD). In this paper we investigate two such theoretical frameworks and the indicators that they suggest. Indicators associated with weak sustainability are characterized by aggregative indicators such as green national income. We conclude, however, that a more promising offshoot of green accounting is measures of genuine savings (i.e. savings adjusted for loss of assets). To achieve SD, genuine savings rates must not be persistently negative. Strong sustainability indicators accord a more central role to the conservation of critical natural assets within the broader goal of prudently managing a nation's portfolio of assets over time. We discuss two approaches and conclude that, while measures of resilience are potentially attractive, more research is required regarding the resilience SD link. However, an important conclusion that we can make is that, even in an economy operating under a strong sustainability regime, genuine savings are still key indicators of SD and are complementary to measures of changes in stocks of critical natural assets.

Date: 1996
View citations in EconPapers

Downloads: (external link)
http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S1355770X00000395 link to article abstract page (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cup:endeec:v:1:y:1996:i:01:p:85-101_00

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Environment and Development Economics from Cambridge University Press
Address: The Edinburgh Building, Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 2RU UK
Series data maintained by Mike Eden ().