Abstract
Sustainability assessment has emerged as a key decision-support process in development cooperation in response to the growing acknowledgement of the impacts of global change. This paper aims at conceptualizing the effectiveness of sustainability assessment as applied in development cooperation, by focusing on the sustainability assessment practice by actors of the official Belgian Development Cooperation. The conceptualization of the effectiveness of sustainability assessment is synthesized in a set of issues and concerns, based on semi-structured interviews. The paper highlights the specificity of sustainability assessment in the development cooperation sector (e.g., through the cultural and discursive compatibility dimensions of assessment in a North-South context). Effectiveness is inherently linked to the expected functions of sustainability assessment in the decision-making process, which include fostering organizational change, shaping contextually adapted framings of sustainability and operationalizing the sustainability transition. These findings highlight the relevance of a discourse-sensitive approach to sustainability assessment if one is to strengthen its credibility and legitimacy.
Highlights
IntroductionThere is a growing sense of urgency for integrating sustainability into development cooperation
There is a growing sense of urgency for integrating sustainability into development cooperation.This urgency could be attributed to the rise of environmental issues on the international political agenda, the visible and projected consequences of climate change in the South [1], and the acknowledgement of the interrelationships between environmental vulnerability, aid efficiency and poverty reduction, in developing countries [2]
The interviews yielded insights that allowed the synthesis of 27 concerns and needs regarding sustainability assessment effectiveness in a development cooperation context (Table 4)
Summary
There is a growing sense of urgency for integrating sustainability into development cooperation. This urgency could be attributed to the rise of environmental issues on the international political agenda, the visible and projected consequences of climate change in the South [1], and the acknowledgement of the interrelationships between environmental vulnerability, aid efficiency and poverty reduction, in developing countries [2]. Sustainability assessment is not a prescribed process as yet (contrary to the codified nature of environmental impact assessment and strategic environmental assessment). It is rather an orientation of practice [9] that allows for many degrees of freedom in developing context-specific definitions, methods and applications
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