Representing, reducing or removing complexity : indicators of sustainability and fiscal sustainability

Abstract

During the last two decades numerous indicators measuring sustainability and its different dimensions have been created. The 2007 economic crisis led to increased scrutiny of public sector fiscal imbalances, and efforts to create more sophisticated measures of fiscal sustainability. The literature on this recent formulation and use of sustainability indicators is broad and contested. It however largely tends to focus on fiscal components, while wider meanings of sustainability are accounted for to a lesser degree. This working paper examines the conceptual and empirical questions relating to the production of indicators of sustainability, both in the sense of fiscal sustainability and sustainable development. It also discusses the uses of sustainability indicators.