A Spatial Analysis of the Achievements, in Terms of Regional Development, Accomplished by the Initial EU-Member Cohesion Fund Beneficiaries Using a Synthetic Indicator

Abstract

This study proposes construction of a synthetic indicator to measure progress toward the objective of economic and social cohesion among the regions of Spain, Greece, Ireland and Portugal within the framework of European Community Regional Policy and the spatial disparities among these countries. Our aim is to integrate, in a single indicator, a large number of variables defined by the European Commission to monitor improvements in regional development, classified according to the objectives of the Europe 2020 Strategy to promote smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. To achieve this goal, we use the Pena distance method for the year 2013.

Human Rights in the Least Developed Countries of Asia: An Index for Quantifying Sustainable Development Goal 3 (Good Health and Wellbeing)

“…To achieve our goal, our article is organized around the methodology of the DP 2 indicator, based on its main mathematical properties and advantages. This technique verifies all of the mathematical properties required of a good synthetic social indicator and enables estimation of regional disparities [27,29,30,32,35,37,40,[47][48][49][50][51][52]. It also guarantees that the weight of the partial indicators is determined in a non-arbitrary manner [36].…”

“…This method is designed to make comparisons among regions and has been used in a number of studies. Currently, DP 2 is widely used by scientists around the world to measure welfare, quality of life, and other similar concepts, such as poverty, at regional, national, and SDG levels [17,18,22,24,26,27,[29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][40][41][42][43][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62][63][64]. Our article uses this method to measure fulfilment of SDG3 on Good Health and Wellbeing, as defined by the UN in the LDCs of Asia, enabling comparison of nine countries using SDG3 as a reference.…”

“…These countries have serious deficiencies and economic and social inequalities [5,11], within a territory that gives them homogeneitythe continent of Asia-and that need special support from the international community [5]. LDCs are generally considered as requiring the highest level of attention from the international community, more than other countries, as they are not able to emerge from their situation poverty [28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44]. The UN sends a strong signal to the development partners of these countries and points to the need for special international support measures and concessions in their favor [5,11].…”

“…This study develops an indicator, known as Pena's DP 2 distance method [24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38], to measure fulfilment of the UN's SDG3 in the LDCs of Asia. We use this indicator to analyze the disparities in 2018, taking SDG3 as the reference within the framework of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development [3].…”

The Measurement of Social Cohesion at Province Level in Poland Using Metric and Interval-Valued Data

“…When one analyses the conceptualisation of social cohesion, it is possible to track the direction of changes which reflect the increasing role of socio-cultural and political indicators and the omission of the economic sphere. In contrast, a similar review of social cohesion research reveals that the emphasis is shifting towards spatial analysis of social cohesion, which takes into account not only the national but also regional and local level [36][37][38][39]. Moreover, a given society's level of social cohesion can only be properly assessed when it can be compared across territorial units and over time.…”