Measuring Policy Coherence among the MEAs and MDGs

This research paper proposes and applies a quantitative methodology to measure policy coherence among Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs) and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Using content analysis of strategy documents, the authors develop a Policy Coherence Matrix (PCM) to evaluate the degree of integration across goals, instruments, and actors.

• The authors define policy coherence as the 'systematic promotion of mutually reinforcing policies across government departments and agencies creating synergies towards achieving the defined objective', emphasizing that integration occurs when objectives, goals, actors, procedures, and instruments are explicitly linked.
• The proposed measurement methodology consists of a two-phase process: first, a conceptual content analysis using search engines to determine the frequency of keywords related to goals, instruments, and actors; and second, the use of quantitative techniques to normalize this data into a Policy Coherence Matrix (PCM) to compute a Degree of Policy Coherence (DPL).
• In an analysis of four MEAs (CBD, UNCCD, Ramsar, and UNFCCC), the degree of policy coherence was calculated at 48%, with a corresponding degree of policy incoherence of 52%.
• Among the analyzed MEAs, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) was found to be the most effective at representing the issues of other conventions, while the Ramsar Convention performed the worst in this regard.
• The analysis revealed that the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) is the worst represented convention within the documents of other MEAs, which the authors describe as a 'disturbing finding' given the prevalence of the rural poor in arid and semi-arid areas.
• When including the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in the analysis with the MEAs, the degree of incoherence increased to 62%, while coherence dropped to 38% (reported as 48% in the text, though the calculation 12.32/20 suggests 61.6% incoherence).
• The UNFCCC was found to be less represented in other MEA documents than expected, which the authors suggest may be due to the convention's heavy focus on carbon markets and the fact that the adaptation agenda is not yet fully developed.
• The authors argue that 100% policy coherence is an 'undesirable goal' because it would erase the distinct identity and specific objectives of individual agreements, such as the difference between the CBD and UNCCD.

APA

Duraiappah, A. K., & Bhardwaj, A. (2007). Measuring Policy Coherence among the MEAs and MDGs. International Institute for Sustainable Development. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/measuring_policy.pdf

Chicago

Duraiappah, Anantha Kumar, and Asmita Bhardwaj. Measuring Policy Coherence among the MEAs and MDGs. International Institute for Sustainable Development, 2007. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/measuring_policy.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Duraiappah |first1=Anantha Kumar |last2=Bhardwaj |first2=Asmita |title=Measuring Policy Coherence among the MEAs and MDGs |publisher=International Institute for Sustainable Development |date=2007 |url=https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/measuring_policy.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{duraiappah2007measuring, author = {Duraiappah, Anantha Kumar and Bhardwaj, Asmita}, title = {{Measuring Policy Coherence among the MEAs and MDGs}}, institution = {International Institute for Sustainable Development}, year = {2007}, url = {https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/measuring_policy.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }