Context: The use of evidence in policymaking can take various forms, and resorting to quantitative indicators is one of them. In the past 30 years, a plethora of indicator-based initiatives for assessing and monitoring progress towards sustainability have emerged at the international, national, and local levels. Such measurement endeavours are particularly challenging given the normative and contested nature of the sustainability concept.
Despite the abundance of sustainability indicators (SIs) initiatives, few empirical inquiries exist concerning the implications of the multiple definitions and measurements of sustainability, the drivers for and barriers to the application of such indicators by public entities, and the mechanisms underlying the use of SIs. This is especially true for local governments, although they are recognized as crucial actors in the implementation of sustainable development.
Goals: The main goal of the thesis is to elucidate how urban SIs are related to policy and decision-making processes in cities and how they can better contribute to sustainability transition. The thesis addresses how SIs define urban sustainability, analyses the relationship between sustainability-related concepts and issues and their measurement, examines local governments-related factors that influence the application of SIs, how these indicators are used in decision-making, and the determinants of different types of uses.
Methods: The thesis mainly investigates the Swiss case and relies mostly on a unique survey of nearly 100 Swiss cities. The survey was completed by official statistics and document search and analysis. These data were examined using exploratory factor analysis, logistic regressions, and multiple correspondence analysis, to identify the factors influencing the application of SIs by cities, the types of SIs use, and their determinants. Further quantitative and qualitative descriptive analyses were performed to analyse the implications of different perspectives about sustainability on measurement, based on a sample of 67 international indicator sets and two indicator initiatives applied by Swiss cities.
Results: The results show that it is relevant to address the socioeconomic and political/policy context of SIs application, the origin of the concepts and issues they measure, and the underlying framing of sustainability. Results also show that a minority of cities apply SIs. They suggest that data availability is a limiting factor and that multilevel initiatives favour SIs application. Endogenous factors, mostly related to an overall sustainability-favourable organisational infrastructure, positively influence the application of SIs. Furthermore, the purposes for which SIs are applied and the diversity of local government actors involved in their implementation influence their use.
Conclusion: The thesis underlines the importance of taking into account the context in which SIs are applied and the particular vision of sustainability SIs sets convey. It suggests that innovative approaches are needed to harness the potential of SIs in contributing to the implementation of sustainability by cities, and thus to sustainability transition.