The Earth Charter and the ESDInds Initiative: Developing Indicators and Assessment Tools for Civil Society Organisations to Examine the Values Dimensions of Sustainability Projects
Abstract
This descriptive report outlines an innovative project in which ECI is actively involved which aims to develop approaches, indicators and tools for Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) to be able to measure values-based aspects and impacts of their work at the project level. Many CSOs have an intuitive feel that their projects are more successful when there is a resonance of values with those involved; this project aims to make such aspects tangible and measurable, and transferable to other CSOs.
The two-year, EU funded project called ESDinds is characterised by a collaborative partnership between a geographically and culturally diverse consortium consisting of four CSOs (including the Earth Charter International Secretariat) and two universities. The research design takes an iterative, grounded research approach to indicator development.