指标的抉择:概念、方法与应用

本文概述了指标的发展历程,着重介绍了英固城市与区域规划背景下指标的发展情况,并为未来的指标研究和深入发展提供了线索.本文的观点和建议是对经济与社会研究理事会(ESRC:Economic and Social Research Council)所资助的一项研究项目成果的阐释,该研究项目旨在识别出用于衡量地方经济发展潜力的指标,以及用于建立一个城镇指标数据库的方法,这一数据库用来帮助副首相办公室(ODPM:the Office of Deputy Prime Minister)监测城市白皮书(Urban White Paper)执行的力度.文章讨论的内容主要围绕五大问题:城市与区域规划评价指标发展的理论、概念与度量之间的关系；政策背景的重要性与指标研究的价值；社会科学家在指标演化过程中所扮演的角色；指标在为政策制定以及数据建设提供信息上的作用；最后综合评价了不同分析方法的优缺点.

Indicators at the Crossroads: Ideas, Methods and Applications

This paper provides an overview of the development of indicators,with an emphasis on the British urban and regional planning contexts.It then proposes some pointers to set the agenda for future research and development to move forward the development of indicators.The arguments and suggestions are illustrated with?ndings from a research project funded by the Economic and Social Research Council on identifying indicators to measure local economic development potential,and the approach used to develop a town and city indicators database for the Of?ce of the Deputy Prime Minister to monitor the performance of the Urban White Paper.The discussion focuses on?ve broad sets of issues,namely the linkage between theories,concepts and measurement in the development of indicators for urban and regional planning;the importance of policy contexts and values in indicator research;the role of social scientists in the process of indicator development;the use of indicators to inform policy decisions and the data infrastructure;and?nally the strengths and weaknesses of different analytical methods to provide research synthesis.