Sustainability impact assessments: Limits, thresholds and the sustainability choice space

Abstract

Sustainability impact assessments (SIA) are inherently difficult because they often require policy advisors to compare things that are not easily compared. For example, they generally require an evaluation of policy proposals or options across the 'three pillars' of economy, society and environment. In this chapter we explore how decisions are made in relation to questions about the sustainability of policies, and show how the consideration of sustainability limits can help integrate thinking across the economic, social and environmental domains. It is argued that in relation to questions about the sustainability of actions or policies, outcomes merely need to be sufficient to maintain human well-being and that the search for optimal strategies is probably misleading. The concept of a sustainability choice space is developed as a way of helping policy advisors visualise and explore what 'room for manoeuvre' they might have in the design of a specific policy. The sustainability choice space can be used to describe the degree to which alternative policy outcomes are acceptable to stakeholders across a range of criteria. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the role that the concept of a sustainability choice space might have as part of the sustainability impact assessment toolkit being developed through SENSOR, and how it can be extended by the involvement of stakeholders in the definition of sustainability limits and the kinds of trade-offs that need to considered in a multifunctional landscape. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2008.