Troje, D (2024) Charting the course: Navigating sustainability priorities in Swedish housing companies. In: Thomson, C (ed.) Proceedings of 40th Annual ARCOM Conference, 2-4 September 2024, London South Bank University, UK.
Abstract
Housing companies must increasingly prioritise between multiple and often conflicting sustainability demands to address wicked societal challenges. The paper seeks to understand this prioritisation, and what criteria influence their decisions on what sustainability goals to pursue and solutions to implement. By conducting 22 interviews within Swedish housing companies, and by applying a multi criteria decision analysis (MCDA) framework, the findings show how housing companies struggle with sustainable decision making. To facilitate this messy process, they base their sustainable decision-making on criteria related to calculations, evaluations, and visualisations; what is most profitable and cost-effective; on internal and external demands; and on urgency. By understanding these criteria, the paper contributes insights into improving sustainability practices, highlights the importance of structured decision-making processes, and how this can be achieved.
| Item Type: | Conference Paper (Paper) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | housing; multi-criteria; decision-making; prioritisation; sustainability |
| Index terms: | sustainable decision making, decision-making process, multi-criteria decision analysis, interview, visualization, sustainability demand, decision-making, housing |
| Subjects: | sustainability assessment, design practice, data collection methods, decision analysis, construction type, environmental resource management |
| Topics: | Construction Technology, Sustainability, Risk Management, Research Practice, Design Practice |
| Descriptive scope: | 3 PCE |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here