Sustainability evaluation based on the three-stage difference-driven model: a case study of the province, autonomous region, and municipality in Western China

Sustainability is a key factor in regional economic, social, and environmental development. In this study, we constructed a regional sustainability system of 24 indicators by combining the Sustainable Development Goals and triple-bottom-line model to evaluate sustainability in the provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities (12 regions) of western China. We further propose a novel three-stage difference-driven model, which includes a dynamic objective weighting method that considers the correlation between indicators’ status and development trends, introducing a time factor to highlight the difference in indicator values among different periods. Based on this model, the dynamic indicator weight, comprehensive sustainability performance, sustainability trends, and coordination among the various dimensions were analysed. The evaluation results indicated that regional sustainability was differentiated at the spatial level from 2000 to 2019. The sustainability performance and average annual growth rate in southwest China were superior to those in northwest China. The 12 regions performed better in social and environmental dimensions than in economic dimensions, implying that the economy is the main point of restriction for regional sustainable development. The coordinated development of these regions was not particularly high, with all coordination degrees below 0.7. Additionally, the average growth rates of the coupling degree and coupling coordination degree in the southwest were higher than those in the northwest. These findings can guide regional policymakers in formulating sustainable development measures.