Analysis of the structure and criteria in the elaboration of a sustainability index
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18472/SustDeb.v8n2.2017.21516Keywords:
Sustentabilidade, Indicadores, Normalização, Ponderação, AgregaçãoAbstract
The sustainability of human-environmental systems currently represents the best choice for its continuity.
Sustainability index can be used for possibly identifying the direction of sustainability, although
regarded as complex and subjective. Therefore, this study aims to analyze the process of constructing
a sustainability index, by identifying main definitions, structure and methods. The used methodology included qualitative research, with data collection from literature review and interpretation analysis. The
results illustrate that the structure of a sustainability index is developed by identifying the aims and the
human-environmental system, by the selection, normalization, ponderation and aggregation of indices,
thus generating the index. We conclude that there is no single model for the process of elaborating
sustainability index, so different processes can be used, differing in their quality of measurement of
sustainability. Additionally, the choice for a process is related to the available information on the
measured subsystem. In this context, it is recommended great attention, once the generated index
could present unsatisfactory and unrealistic results.
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