A re-evaluation of how well each country is doing in terms of achieving the SDGs: An objective approach based on multi-criteria-decision-analysis

Abstract

Adopting Agenda 2030, the UN issued a set of sustainable development report consisting of 17 goals. The indices created by these goals are beneficial in defining the position of a particular country across the years; however, it is relatively complex to compare its position to other countries. This is not just because it requires an extensive analysis but also because the weight of each goal must be different. It is hard to determine which goal is more important than the others, as it differs from one specialist to another. Then how should we determine the goal weights without falling into the trap of subjective suggestions? That is our question for this research paper. Therefore, we use the multiple-criteria decision-making approach (MCDM) in order to characterise each country's position more accurately. Doing so, we get diverse weights instead of just using the SDGs' arithmetical averages. Therefore, our findings show slightly different rankings than the UN’s SDG report 2022.