Natural language processing and network analysis provide novel insights on policy and scientific discourse around Sustainable Development Goals

© 2021. The Author(s)..

The United Nations' (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are heterogeneous and interdependent, comprising 169 targets and 231 indicators of sustainable development in such diverse areas as health, the environment, and human rights. Existing efforts to map relationships among SDGs are either theoretical investigations of sustainability concepts, or empirical analyses of development indicators and policy simulations. We present an alternative approach, which describes and quantifies the complex network of SDG interdependencies by applying computational methods to policy and scientific documents. Methods of Natural Language Processing are used to measure overlaps in international policy discourse around SDGs, as represented by the corpus of all existing UN progress reports about each goal (N = 85 reports). We then examine if SDG interdependencies emerging from UN discourse are reflected in patterns of integration and collaboration in SDG-related science, by analyzing data on all scientific articles addressing relevant SDGs in the past two decades (N = 779,901 articles). Results identify a strong discursive divide between environmental goals and all other SDGs, and unexpected interdependencies between SDGs in different areas. While UN discourse partially aligns with integration patterns in SDG-related science, important differences are also observed between priorities emerging in UN and global scientific discourse. We discuss implications and insights for scientific research and policy on sustainable development after COVID-19.

Medienart:

E-Artikel

Erscheinungsjahr:

2021

Erschienen:

2021

Enthalten in:

Zur Gesamtaufnahme - volume:11

Enthalten in:

Scientific reports - 11(2021), 1 vom: 17. Nov., Seite 22427

Sprache:

Englisch

Beteiligte Personen:

Smith, Thomas Bryan [VerfasserIn]
Vacca, Raffaele [VerfasserIn]
Mantegazza, Luca [VerfasserIn]
Capua, Ilaria [VerfasserIn]

Links:

Volltext

Themen:

Journal Article
Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

Anmerkungen:

Date Completed 07.12.2021

Date Revised 04.04.2024

published: Electronic

Citation Status MEDLINE

doi:

10.1038/s41598-021-01801-6

funding:

Förderinstitution / Projekttitel:

PPN (Katalog-ID):

NLM33327475X