ABSTRACT
One of the endemic problems of most kinds of policy analysis is the need to relate quantitative information to that which cannot be quantified. In environmental impact assessment it is the problem of the often non-measurable value of wildlife and scenic amenities. Social impact assessment itself arose in part from the failures of other techniques to adequately incorporate intangible social factors into their analysis. One of the main responses to the general problem of quantification and assessing the meaning of social change has been the attempt to integrate subjective preference rankings into the rational techniques by using some form of indifference analysis. A second way of dealing with qualitative impacts is to use what is termed a sensitivity analysis to establish possible upper and lower, or best and worst, estimates for those impacts, and then to demonstrate the effect of a number of potential scenarios on the various policy choices.
