Multicriterion analysis and the evaluation of restoration policies for a Rhine estuary

In 1991, two decades after the Dutch installed drainage sluices at Haringvliet in the Rhine delta, in the process converting the Haringvliet-Hollandsch Diep-Biesbosch (HHB) estuary into a tidally-damped, fresh-water system, a study was commissioned to evaluate alternative management policies for that system. Among those policies were ones which would at least partially restore estuarine conditions to the HHB. Policies were defined in terms of alternative programs for sluice operation and for cleanup of contaminated bottom sediments. This paper describes the public policy analysis comprising the study, focusing on the role played by the Analytic Hierarchy Process and multicriterion analysis (MCA) in general, and on the aspects of the decision-making context which made the use of MCA so effective.