Assessing and determining social sustainability: An Onset and an Attempt

In this chapter, the authors continue the systematisation by adding an assessment aid, although a word of caution is needed. They present different aspects that they believe are relevant to any notion of social sustainability. The authors operationalise social sustainability in terms of stakeholder, knowledge, learning and organisational issues, where the last can be seen in terms of co-ordination mechanisms and organisational structures. The chapter describes the instrument. In general, an instrument in the form of a questionnaire can have at least three forms. First, it can be a categorisation structure. Second, it is possible to attach ordinal scales to answers. Third, a questionnaire can have the form of a construct that is measured and of which the outcome is an indication of a certain correct or incorrect state of affairs. With respect to both the individual level of description and the various kinds of organisational levels of description, the authors try to operationalise units, teams, groups, firms and societies.