Use Of Social Indicators Research Articles

Communication and Data Processing in Local Public Group: Transparency and Accountability

The purpose of this story is to identify the role of information in the municipal public group with a view to New Public Governance and the need for mutual exchange between citizens and public bodies. The conducted analysis is quantitative subjective; the theory is demonstrated through the focus of a real case to increase the understanding of theoretical assumptions. The carried-out elaboration, after having identified the variables considered and the possible mathematical relationship between variables. The New Public Governance (NPG) sees public affection closely related to the need for information, this leads to study the real effects towards a new theory of citizen choice. The study shows that the use and dissemination of communication and processing tools in local authorities can have a positive impact on responsibility and transparency, improving trust in local governments and citizen participation in civic or political life. The information provided through open organic data on all sectors ensures greater trust in local public bodies and civic participation. The use of social indicators is a useful tool for assessing population satisfaction and understanding of the information provided to better plan and plan public services and municipal group interventions. The identified tools can be used to analyse the relapse and the involvement of both information and processing tools in the process of communicating the outputs to the stakeholders. All municipal groups have new tools for assessing planning and control. New analysis of the role of information in NPG.

CSR reporting practices of Eurozone companies

For most of the world's largest companies, reporting on non-financial information appears to be a continuing trend.Communication of social and environmental dimensions of the company plays a key role in the sustainable development of organizations, and therefore should be investigated more in depth.The aim of this empirical study is to analyse the extent to which Eurozone companies report on CSR indicators, according to the Integrated Scorecard Taxonomy Scoreboard of the Spanish Accounting and Business Association (AECA), and the factors that can influence its use.A content analysis was conducted on the annual sustainability reports on the websites of 306 Eurozone companies listed in the STOXX Europe 600.The results revealed an intensive use of corporate governance indicators, a moderate disclosure of environmental key performance indicators (KPIs), and a low use of social indicators. Our study also showed that there is an influence of sector, and the listing in DJSI on the extent of sustainability reporting.

A Biography of Kenneth C. Land: Pioneer in Quality of Life and Social Indicators Research

Kenneth C. Land was born in the small town of Llano, Texas (population 3,000) on August 19, 1942. He earned Bachelor of Arts degrees in Sociology and History at Texas Lutheran College in 1964, a Master of Arts degree in Sociology, minoring in Mathematics, from the University of Texas-Austin in 1966, and a Ph. D. in Sociology, minoring in Mathematics, from the University of Texas-Austin in 1969. He was a Social Science Research Council Postdoctoral Fellow in Mathematical Statistics at Columbia University from 1969–1970. And later Ken was successively a member of the faculties of the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign and the University of Texas at Austin before joining the Duke Sociology Department as Chairman, which he served from January 1986 to August 1997. Ken was named the John Franklin Crowell Professor of Sociology and Demography at Duke University in 1990. Ken’s contributions to social indicators/quality-of-life/well-being studies commenced during his Social Science Research Council Post-Doctoral Fellowship year at Columbia University. Dr. Eleanor Sheldon of the Russell Sage Foundation had initiated the Indicators of Social Change research project at the Foundation. She interviewed Ken and signed him up to work on the project on a part-time basis during the PostDoctoral year and then as a Staff Member of the Foundation for 3 years after that. The first product of Ken’s work at Russell Sage was the article “On the Definition of Social Indicators (1971).” In this article Ken, outlined the characteristics of social indicators, and specified that “... the criterion for classifying a social statistic as a social indicator is its informative value which derives from its empirically verified nexus in a conceptualization of a social process” (p. 323, emphasis in original). Pursuing this line of thought, in the 1970s and 1980s Ken organized a number of conferences and workshops to focus on the use of social indicators, and each resulted in an edited volume of the work presented. He and sociologist Seymour Spilerman coordinated a Russell Sage Foundation-sponsored Conference on Social Indicators Models, to explore models that could be used to form indicators of the functioning of social systems and analyze their interconnections and changes over time. As a member Applied Research Quality Life (2014) 9:1111–1114 DOI 10.1007/s11482-014-9337-z

The Development of the Good Relations Measurement Framework in Britain: A Template for Experiential Social Measurement

This article explores the development of the Good Relations Measurement Framework (GRMF), the first attempt in Britain to create a framework designed to measure how people experience their lives, specifically in relation to their interactions with each other. It provides a reference point for others seeking to construct social indicator measurement frameworks which capture the experiential in the social policy field. In a wider sense, it provides a case study of the use of social indicators within the policy process in the modern polity. The overall objective of the GRMF is to measure the state of Good Relations in Britain. Seven key areas emerged as being crucial for the development of measurement frameworks during the construction of the GRMF. Firstly, a decision has to be taken about the extent to which social measurement frameworks are confined to measurement only or are to have a normative element. Secondly, a working definition of the subject area is needed early in the process. Thirdly, an element of consultation with the public is important. A fourth issue relates to the practical method of construction through the use of ‘long lists’ of potential indicators, and finding a balance between an ‘ideal’ list of potential indicators emerging from public consultation and a second list of existing indicators drawn from existing surveys. A fifth issue relates to the availability of social indicator data at an appropriate geographical level. A sixth issue is that social indicators drawn from different surveys are not always comparable. A final factor is that while quantitative indicators are useful as a tool of social measurement, qualitative research adds a further dimension which is especially important in particular circumstances.

Social Indicators of Gentrification Pressure in Fishing Communities: A Context for Social Impact Assessment

The use of social indicators in this analysis of coastal communities enhances the evaluation of the combined impacts of changes in fisheries management regulations and gentrification for fisheries social impact assessments. Increasing population pressure, declining fish stocks, and the attractiveness of natural amenities have all led to demographic shifts and economic transformations for many coastal communities dependent on fishing. This impact of “gentrification” on the commercial fishing industry often precipitates a move toward non-marine based economies that can displace local residents and their dependence on fishing as a way of life with resulting impacts to local economies and cultures. Drawing on the United States Census, National Marine Fisheries Service, and other secondary data sources, social indicators were developed for 2,948 coastal communities in the Eastern United States and Gulf Coast and were used to evaluate gentrification pressure in select communities highly engaged in fishing. We anticipate this methodology, when groundtruthed and then combined with time-series assessments, will lead to improvements in the assessment of fishing community vulnerability and resilience for the conduct of fisheries social impact assessments.

A review and synthesis of social indicators for sustainable forest management

This review synthesizes some of the main themes of social sustainability indicators for forest management, and addresses conceptual categories, issues, and limitations associated with the use of social indicators. Socio-cultural values and conditions associated with quality of life, public access to non-market benefits and resources, governance, and community stability are discussed. The paper illustrates how a selection of social indicators has been prescribed and used within various sustainable forest management (SFM) systems of criteria and indicators (c&I) at different scales from the international to the local in British Columbia. Social indicators are, in general, weakly developed relative to ecological and economic indicators. Standard c&I systems often omit crucial social indicators, or include them without specific definitions or measurable benchmarks. Recommendations are made for future research that examines the fundamental nature of social indicators and their underlying cause-and-effect relationships, and supports improved methods and tools for integrating social indicators into forest management and decision making. The role of forestry in contributing to broader social indicators, such as sense of place and community cohesion, needs to be clarified.

Social Indicators and Measurements of Vulnerability for Gulf Coast Fishing Communities

Social indicators as measures of economic or social well‐being have existed since the early 1970s. It is only recently that the use of social indicators have become of some utility to fisheries management. Prior to the revision of the Magnuson‐Stevens Act and the addition of National Standard 8, there were only a handful of studies that collected the types of data that could be used to create such indices. However, with the addition of a provision to define and identify fishing communities in the Act (National Standard 8), the ongoing collection of census and other statistical data on fishing communities has been instituted. This article describes the creation of a “vulnerability index” consisting of measures of employment opportunity and community well‐being from census and other data sources that was used as part of the social impact discussion. The index provides an indication of which fishing communities might be affected the most by the choice of several management alternatives included in a recent Environmental Impact Statement for the Essential Fish Habitat Amendment for the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council. This article concludes with a discussion of the need for improved data and methods to assist fishery managers with social impacts and the personnel to write and review such assessments, as fishing communities in the Gulf of Mexico are rapidly changing.

Using Child and Family Indicators to Influence Communities and Policy in Los Angeles County

This article presents a case study on the use of social indicators to guide community action and influence policy decisions around children and families in Los Angeles County California. Since the early 1990s, the Children's Planning Council has incorporated strategic use of data in all of its planning and community organizing. The Council has developed a unique set of strategies for using social indicators, in combination with large-scale organizing, to convene stakeholders, change perceptions and influence decison-making. The article describes the Council, the theoretical framework that guides its approach to data, key issues that have guided its information strategies, and the challenges that still lie ahead.

Social Cohesion and Living Conditions in the Canadian Arctic: From Theory to Measurement

Social cohesion has emerged as a powerfulhybrid concept used by academics and policyanalysts. Academics use the concept tounderline the social and economic failings ofmodernity, linking it to the decline ofcommunal values and civic participation. Policy analysts use it to highlight the socialand economic inequities caused byglobalization. The desired effect of usingthis concept is often to influence governmentsto implement policies that will enhance socialcohesion by reducing social and economicdisparities. Despite its widespread use,however, statistical measures of socialcohesion tend to overlook local, non-Westernstrategies of social inclusion as well as thesocial impact of non-Western economic systems,such as the mixed economy typical of manyAboriginal communities in North America. Inthis paper, we develop a model of socialcohesion that addresses these omissions throughthe use of social indicators that measure boththe behavior and perceptions of Inuit living inthe Canadian Arctic with respect to the social,cultural and economic conditions of Arcticcommunities. We explain how and why measuringsocial cohesion is optimized by combining bothculturally-specific and non-specific socialindicators.

Use of social indicators in assessment of local community alcohol and other drug dependence treatment needs within Chicago.

The State Systems Development Program of the US Center for Substance Abuse Treatment supports needs assessment studies conducted through state authorities. This article reports results of a social indicator study funded through this program of alcohol and other drug dependence (AODD) treatment needs specific to communities in Chicago, Illinois. Purposes of study analyses were: identify theoretical factors underlying a large set of social indicators, determine degree to which resultant factor scale scores predict community resident admissions to publicly-funded AODD treatment, and explore usefulness of factor scale scores in grouping communities into planning regions. Cautions and limitations in interpretation of results are discussed.

Social and institutional performance indicators for wildlife and fishery resource management systems

Abstract Following a model based on the development and use of social indicators in the field of public administration, the article describes a system of wildlife and fishery resource management indicators for all dimensions of the resource management complex. The system includes a comprehensive series of biologic, social, and institutional dimensions. These dimensions are arrayed with four management system components—inputs, processes, outputs, and impacts—to form a 16‐cell matrix containing 377 resource management indicators. Social and institutional dimensions are discussed as being most in need of explicit management attention. The indicator system has utility for improving all phases of the management process, from goal‐ and objective‐setting through evaluation. Use of the indicator system will lead to more comprehensive and explicit resource management decisions and will help identify promising new areas for research, especially in the human dimension.

On the use of social indicators for planning

A social indicator in the context of planning, which induces a course of social change, is not a mere ‘good statistic’. While its validity depends on the relation drawn among its constituent properties, its relevance would depend upon the sequential relations it can draw with the other variables concerned with the envisaged course of change. And its necessity and efficiency will be rated accordingly as it can epitomize the situation which all these variables depict. A properly constructed set of indicators, therefore, may not only suggest the planning measures which should be employed but also throw light on a better formulation of the targets, goals and even the objective of planning. These points are briefly discussed in this paper with illustrations from India.

Political and bureaucratic dilemmas in social indicators for policy making

This paper identifies a variety of political and bureaucratic constraints on the use of social indicators in policy making, including those associated with nonuse, misuse, quantification, and value-weighting. The basic elements in the policy making process are identified as value-conflict, bureaucratic maintenance, and analytic rationality. These elements and the activites of policy making are then related to social indicator research. Means for overcoming the constraints are discussed including: the use of sensitivity analysis, improved communication, a commitment to intellectural pluralism and moral responsibility, and especially improved policy modeling.

The Problems with Social Indicators

Researchers often use social indicators in their analysis of community problems and the subsequent proposals.However these researchers rarely consider the constraints placed on these indicators by construction and measurement problems. Some of these indicators are reviewed with particular reference to conceptualization of social phenomena and the intrusion of values. In the latter regard comment is made on the use of social indicators by political decision makers and policy planners.

Social indicators of youth development and educational performance: A programmatic statement

This paper argues for the use of social indicators, in conjunction with the traditional norm-referenced and criterion-referenced tests, to assess the effects of local educational systems. A conceptual framework for the study of educational performance is presented, interrelating (1) personal resources invested by youth, (2) opportunities for development, (3) developmental behaviors, (4) educational system impacts, and (5) other contextual variables, which together affect (6) progress toward adulthood. Four types of variables and 15 content areas that should be monitored are described, with examples of social indicators for each. Procedures are presented for selecting variables, collecting time-series data, and analyzing and reporting the indicators, relying entirely on existing data sources. Appendices include a data base screening form, a statistic screening form, and a list of United States national, state, county, and city sources of time-series data relevant to youth development and educational performance.

The U.S. federal effort in developing social indicators

As an introduction to this issue, some historical background of the effort of the U.S. Federal goverment in tracking social trends and making use of social indicators is reviewed. The 1934 study, Recent Social Trends in the United States, and the monographs analyzing demographic trends sponsored by the U.S. Bureau of the Census, are seen as antecedents to the current support accorded what has become a kind of triennial Social Indicators publications. The three subject-matter social indicators volumes of the Federal government — Science Indicators, The Condition of Education and Health: U.S.A. — are reviewed in this volume, and the programs of several other agencies, the Bureau. etc., to develop and communicate social indicators are discussed. The forecast for the future of social indicators includes the development of social accounts, the improvement of models that have criterion social indicators as the dependent variable, and the appreciation of the statistical system to provide the information needed for improved monitorship and understanding. These are seen as joint endeavors of the public and private sectors.

Critical appraisal of social indicators

Cochran’s (1979) beginning of a critical appraisal of social indicators deserves attention. Social processes and individual satisfaction are extremely difficult to conceptualize, let alone measure and summarize satisfactorily. Yet, Western societies are eager to obtain and use whatever data seem relevant to public policy and individual decision making. Unless the nature of these data is clearly understood, such data are likely to be used unwisely. Cochran has outlined factors that limit the long-range utility of social indicators: First, any given strategy of measurement will restrict perception at the same time that it provides information; it will suggest definitions of social problems and thereby delimit understanding of those problems. Second, since data limit and direct perception of problems, they also tend to limit and direct perception of how resources should be allocated to solve those problems. Cochran goes on to suggest that a way to increase the utility of social indicators is to critically appraise their nature and use. She hints that critical appraisal might be approached in two ways: by seeking political and administrative insight into the uses and abuses of social indicator data, and by seeking psychological and philosophical insight into the nature and pursuit of social goals. At the political and administrative level of inquiry, the identification of obvious misuses and misinterpretations of social indicator data may suggest wiser decision strategies for the future. At the psychological or philosophical level of inquiry, critical examination of the nature and use of social indicators, the values implicit in social indicators, and the nature and pursuit of human satisfaction may suggest more satisfactory ways to characterize and influence the pursuit of happiness. It may even contribute to the altering of our goals and values. While one may go about these two kinds of inquiry differently, one cannot pursue the first or simpler goal without beginning to pursue the second goal; i.e., one can most intelligently ask whether social indicators are currently used wisely if one has a comprehensive understanding of the possible alternatives. What can be done to explore these two interrelated sets of problems? Who should be responsible for critical inquiry of this kind? The purpose of this commentary is to argue by analogy to the history of mental testing that the responsibility for critical evaluation and beneficent use of social indicators rests largely with social scientists, and to suggest some directions of critical inquiry.

The potential of social indicators: Minimum conditions for impact at the national level as suggested by a study of the use of ?social indicators? 73

Empirical evidence is presented which suggests that the use of social indicators among upper level government officials in the United States is minimal at present. Further, the level of use is not likely to be increased by improved measurement procedures, aesthetically improved packaging, or more widespread dissemination of such information among persons who influence policy decisions. The power of such informa- tion can be expected to be no greater than that of 'mere' statistics unless deliberate effort is made to institutionalize the importance of social indicators into government operations in conjunction with policy planning, goal setting, and commitment to the use of indicators as a system of national evaluation of progress toward the achievement of societal objectives. Several recommendations are made to develop the potential of social indicators and to increase their creative and useful application in matters of public policy at the national level. federal executives with an accessible compendium of policy-relevant social information in various categories including: - Health: Longevity: the quality of health; freedom from disability; and access to health care. - Public Safety: Safety of life and property from crime; fear of crime; and adequacy of the criminal justice system. - Education: Level of basic education; opportunity for and participation in higher and continuing education. -Employment: Opportunity for employment; attitudes concerning working conditions; and the quality and character of employment life. - Income: Level of income; distribution of income; and expenditure of income. - Housing: Housing quality; overall neighborhood satisfaction; comfort and living space. - Leisure andRecreation: Time and facilities for leisure activities; patterns

Social Indicators, Urban Deprivation and Positive Discrimination

ABSTRACTThe use of social indicators in the implementation of area-specific positive discrimination programmes is increasing and is likely to continue to do so. It is important in this context that some of the unintended consequences of their use be appreciated.It is argued that the concentration on the statistical niceties and technical details of social indicators especially as they are applied to the identification of areas of urban deprivation has been misplaced, and the concern for the ‘arithmetic of woe’ has diverted attention away from some of the more fundamental assumptions underlying their use.As predominantly used, social indicators have assumed both that a value consensus exists about the nature and parameters of urban deprivation, when in fact this is an issue of value (and political) conflict, and, more specifically, that urban deprivation springs from social pathology. By default, urban deprivation has been assumed to be that which the indicators measure, when in fact they often reflect no more than existing levels of service provision and current social policies.There is a need for a clear (even if arbitrary) definition of deprivation, and the derivation of indicators from such a definition. In the latter part of the article the author outlines an attempt to do this.

Foreign policy indicators: Predictors of war in history and in the state of the world message

Despite the promising advances in the construction and use of social indicators, there has been little application to the formulation, monitoring, or evaluation of foreign policy. In the formulation stage—our concern here—predictor or early warning indicators could be very useful. The annual “state of the world” message contains many such predictive indicators of war, but in a purely verbal and intuitive form. Three of these (prior war, relative capabilities, and alliance levels) are converted into operational language and then put to the empirical test. In general, the indicators do not predict war (over the past 150 years) as postulated by the Administration. These tests are, however, very incomplete, and our objective is not to evaluate the Administration's arguments, but to suggest one way in which indicators could improve the quality of foreign policy formulation.