Résumé
The objective of this article is to analyse the processes used to construct sustainable development indicators with reference to the multiplicity of their properties. Over and above their measurement function, the authors focus on their role in establishing standards and on the deliberation and dialogue processes that emerge from their collective construction. They suggest a typology of approaches as well as evaluation criteria to characterise them according to sustainable development properties. The authors then transpose these processes into the area of national accounting, showing that indicator building implies a nesting of social and statistical conventions. Whilst historically there has been a specialisation between technical measurement issues and the definition of the objects to be measured, the new sustainable development frame of reference suggests that the two areas should be brought together again but taking into account current imperatives concerning decentralisation and participation. Hence, these imperatives generate a significant challenge in terms of the coordination and convergence of practices, which require a re-thinking of approaches to, and attitudes of, research and implies new collective learning.