Perceived adequacy of policy instruments reveals weak targets in the Sustainable Development Goals

Abstract We report the results of a novel worldwide survey on how adequate are existing policy instruments (if any) across the 169 targets of the Sustainable Development Goals. By obtaining more than 130,000 responses about 146 countries from more than 7000 experts, a large‐scale picture of the existence and adequacy of policy instruments emerges. This survey provides the first dataset depicting the current state of the world according to how well prepared (in terms of instruments) are countries and regions to tackle the challenges posed by the 2030 Agenda. We combine these data with the official UN SDG indicators and identify targets that systematically exhibit weaknesses in their historical performance and the adequacy of the available policy instrument, revealing key policy issues that need to be prioritised through interventions that go beyond the allocation of financial resources.