Paper short abstract:

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) herald a new phase for international development. We present the first comprehensive review of the linkages between goals, targets, indicators and the datasets identified to measure progress towards the SDGs.

Paper long abstract:

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) herald a new phase for international development. To measure progress, the Statistical Commission of the UN's Economic and Social Council has proposed a series of 230 indicators that have now mostly been agreed upon by the UN's inter-agency Expert Group. These include measures of policy implementation as well as specific metrics to assess policy outcomes and effectiveness. We present the first comprehensive review of the linkages between goals, targets, indicators and the datasets identified to measure progress towards the SDGs. As part of our systematic analysis we identified three relationships between target indicators and the datasets selected to measure them. These include (1) instances in which the identified datasets are appropriate for the rigorous evaluation of SDG-related policy and interventions; (2) indicators for which the available datasets are inappropriate to rigorously evaluate policy and intervention outcomes (e.g., because the data are not available at sufficiently fine spatial or temporal resolutions); and (3) instances in which data are simply not available to measure the identified indicators. We compare these to the indicators and data used for the Millennium Development Goals, and argue that governments, international organizations and other implementing agencies should put particular efforts in instances where datasets are inappropriate or are not available, investing in better monitoring and evaluation protocols that might include new original data collection initiatives. In such cases, it is also paramount to establish a coordinated approach to indicator development to enable national and international comparisons across space and time.

Paper short abstract:

This conceptual paper explores how bottom-up considerations could improve companies' social footprint in Ready-Made-Garment industry in the global South. We take a closer look at the ways in which the local workers' perspectives and needs could be given more weight when developing CR practices.

Paper long abstract:

Increasingly, companies located in affluent countries source their products from the global South due to lower production costs. Local governments often support this interest as foreign companies provide employment and influx of investment in various ways. The garment industry is one of the industries which has been shifting production to low-cost countries en masse.

However, there are various systemic problems related to the garment industry, such as salaries below a living wage and exploitation of various forms is commonplace. Freedom of association often exists more in the letter than implementation of law and also in general there is little in the way of enforced legal or societal structures to address adversities in working conditions.

Because of this, we take a closer look at the ways in which the companies' operations affect the countries and populations: even when they adhere to their CR-guidelines, they may simultaneously create environments and situations in which the local factory workers are adversely impacted.

It seems that currently the bottom-up view carries little weight when analyzing and developing CR-perspectives. This is problematic, as in the global market place the mechanisms are often developed in locations, which are geographically and culturally removed from the loci of implementation, and therefore connection between CR-protocols and their impact can be hard to establish. While some of the CR-practices deliver benefits to the workers, what is needed are mechanisms that empower the workers to become active agents in the negotiations regarding working conditions rather than mere beneficiaries of these systems.

Paper short abstract:

Indigenous knowledge and science interlinked by a network of functional nodes marrying together sensitivity to social and geographical environmental with scientific generalities in a dynamic system supported by craft technology derived developmental models of socially contextualised knowledge

Paper long abstract:

Sustainability achievement means change. Indigenous knowledge and western science both have contributions to make. The development of indigenous systems is often difficult to discern. Traditional irrigation and allied agricultural systems have evolved together. Craft knowledge systems constitute an extensive data source showing how such socially contextualised systems can and do respond to change. Western science generates wide ranging generalisations covering multiple diverse situations: traditional, socially contextualised systems respond to specific local conditions and embedding social values. Sustainability requires local circumstances and wider development needs both be accommodated. A rich model of craft knowledge development can be found in traditional shipbuilding. Transition to contemporary science techniques shows how these contrasting approaches can interact. Active Knowledge Networks, derived from this case clarify how a network of individual nodes linked through multiple dialogue channels can accommodate interactions between these different knowledge systems. Successful sustainability achievement calls for multiple, society specific, trade-offs in response to differing social values. Active Knowledge Networks provide a dynamic model in which channels are created to allow local voices to communicate their knowledge of the immediate environment and related social values; interaction with scientific research will then enable the different expertise communities to explore the widest range of mutually acceptable solutions. Attention to the procedures envisaged should create a needed countervailing force to moderate over dominant top-down inputs from donor nations, government administrations, and ubiquitous scientific secretariats and establishments.

Paper short abstract:

This paper looks at the relative effectiveness of public and private education in Pakistan. It conducts analysis to argue that school quality is a key factor in the relatively better performance of private schools, and that national figures conceal significant regional differences.

Paper long abstract:

The private sector has played an increasing role in providing education in Pakistan. This study uses econometric analysis to estimate the differences in academic achievement between children attending private and public schools to ascertain whether private schools are providing better education. It uses a large scale primary data set produced by Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) Pakistan for 2015 and following the literature, uses test scores to estimate the effect of private schools whilst controlling for individual characteristics. It overcomes the selection bias by including parental education variables to proxy for ability to control for more able children going to private schools. This study identifies and addresses the shortcomings of existing empirical literature by looking at school quality and conducting analysis of the private school effect at the regional level. It finds that by allowing the model to change flexibly across regions, the private school effect varies significantly, as does school quality, and this dilutes the private school effect found for the whole country. It concludes that national level analysis is not representative of all regions in Pakistan and instead future research should focus on school quality at the regional level.