Social and Cultural Sustainability: Criteria, Indicators, Verifier Variables for Measurement and Maps for Visualization to Support Planning

Abstract

Policies on economic use of natural resources require considerations to social and cultural values. In order to make those concrete in a planning context, this paper aims to interpret social and cultural criteria, identify indicators, match these with verifier variables and visualize them on maps. Indicators were selected from a review of scholarly work and natural resource policies, and then matched with verifier variables available for Sweden’s 290 municipalities. Maps of the spatial distribution of four social and four cultural verifier variables were then produced. Consideration of social and cultural values in the studied natural resource use sectors was limited. The spatial distribution of the verifier variables exhibited a general divide between northwest and south Sweden, and regional rural and urban areas. We conclude that it is possible to identify indicators and match them with verifier variables to support inclusion of social and cultural values in planning.

Are the Rural Electrification Efforts in the Ecuadorian Amazon Sustainable?

“…These studies underline the importance of openness to participation in the decision-making process by considering the role of informal institutions [22,26]. Decentralization has also been stressed for facilitating participative decision-making, improving in turn the accountability of authorities [34], as well as the adaptability (i.e., the ability to meet the changing needs of the population in remote areas) [30,[35][36][37][38].…”

“…Socio-cultural sustainability embraces notions of social justice, since ensuring the accessibility (i.e., the access to electricity) may improve the life conditions of the rural population in terms of more education (longer study hours due to the availability of electric light) and higher productivity (use of machines) [23,35,37,51,52]. These notions of social justice drive the principle of equity/disparity used to distribute the limited available resources as well as to decide who is provided with electricity [38,39] and the amount of energy to be provided to each person [35,39,53].…”

“…These notions of social justice drive the principle of equity/disparity used to distribute the limited available resources as well as to decide who is provided with electricity [38,39] and the amount of energy to be provided to each person [35,39,53].…”

“…The importance of culture (traditions, values, identities, and cultural diversity) for sustainability has been stressed elsewhere (e.g., [26,35,53,56]). In this regard, cultural justice refers to justice through participation, as well as mutual learning and knowledge sharing [57].…”

What Is Intercultural Sustainability? A First Exploration of Linkages Between Culture and Sustainability in Intercultural Research

“…Duxbury and Gillette (2007) promote culture as an important pillar in the range of sustainability goals. In the example of Sweden, Axelsson et al (2013) even propose quantitative methods to measure a region's cultural sustainability. In another vein, Pearson et al (2010) (JICR) reveal that a strong family communication cohesion will strengthen ethnic and cultural affiliation.…”