Abstract
This paper advances a composite indicator called urban environmental virtuosity index (UEVI), in order to measure the efforts made by public local bodies in applying an ecosystem approach to urban management. UEVI employs the less exploited process-based selection criteria for representing the original concept of virtuosity, providing makes a cross cities comparison. In developing such a framework the main technical issue of constructing a composite indicator, involving the weighting and the aggregation phases will be overcame by using a multivariate approach.
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Notes
Total urban sustainability score is based on three components of the urban sustainability in China: the urban development capacity, urban coordination capacity and urban development potential.
To be clearer, this is different from the “Environmental Policy Performance Indicator” (by Adriaanse A., 1993), “that indicates whether the environmental policy is heading in the right direction or not”. It considers “two independent approaches for the scaling of the theme indicators: division by the corresponding (a) sustainability levels and (b) policy targets for each theme indicator. This results in a common unit (i.e. environmental pressure equivalents—EPeq) for expressing environmental pressure within themes. The composite indicator for each year is calculated as the sum of the six dimensionless theme equivalent” (Saisana and Tarantola 2002, p. 51).
The considered municipalities represent the main urban context in each region.
The imagine has been adapted from Ercolano and Gaeta (2012).
Database ISTAT 2008.
The aim is to verify if UEVI can be affected by a younger population.
These results could be influenced by a political control of the scarcity of water resources, while the latter could be given from the average medium size of municipalities.
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Acknowledgments
This work is a result of continuous and shared ideas between the two authors; however Salvatore Ercolano wrote paragraphs 3,4,5, while Oriana Romano wrote paragraphs 1,2,6. We would like to thank Professors Pietro Rostirolla, Amedeo Di Maio, John Sedgwick, Abay Mulatu and Dr. Rintaro Yamaguchi for the useful comments.
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Romano, O., Ercolano, S. Who Makes the Most? Measuring the “Urban Environmental Virtuosity”. Soc Indic Res 112, 709–724 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0078-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0078-9