Latest contribution
Towards a theory of change to institutionalise integration experts and expertise
By The Aeschiried Integrators
Integration experts and expertise are crucial for realising the full potential of inter- and transdisciplinary research. However, the expertise of those who lead integration is poorly recognized in the current academic system and these academics often experience a range of impediments to their careers. What can be done to recognise integration experts and expertise and to support the careers of such experts?
We define integration experts as specialists “who lead, administer, manage, monitor, assess, accompany, and/or advise others on integration” in order to achieve the full potential of inter- and transdisciplinary research (Hoffmann et al. 2022).
This i2Insights contribution presents the results of a pilot workshop held in Aeschiried, a mountain village in Switzerland, in February 2023 to develop a theory of change focused on Germany and Switzerland to achieve the following:
By 2033, diverse research institutes/universities in Germany and Switzerland have established integration experts as recognized academic positions in their structures and created a durable environment, in which integration experts thrive in order to jointly address wicked problems with their disciplinary colleagues in a systemic and ‘co-productive’ way.
Recent contributions
An analytical framework for knowledge co-production
By Marianne Penker
How can students and academics starting out in transdisciplinary research begin to come to grips with knowledge co-production?
Colleagues and I developed a useful analytical framework comprising the following four elements:
- typology of actor roles (who?)
- research phases (when?)
- objectives and forms of actor integration (why?)
- types of knowledge (what?).
These four elements are illustrated in the figure below.
The development of the framework was based on the literature and our experiences in running a doctoral school on transdisciplinary sustainability research (see Enengel et al. 2012).
Improving facilitated modelling
By Vincent de Gooyert
Here I explore two outcomes of facilitated modelling – cognitive change and consensus forming – and ask: how can achieving those outcomes be improved?
But first, what is facilitated modelling?
Facilitated modelling is an approach where operational researchers act as facilitators to model an issue collaboratively with stakeholders, usually in a workshop. Operational research, also known as operations research, seeks to improve decision-making by developing and applying analytical methods.
Two central aims of facilitated modelling are to achieve cognitive change and to form consensus.
Cognitive change is the idea that participants of facilitated modelling workshops come in with a certain worldview, and that the intervention leads them to learn about the issue and accordingly change their minds.
Lessons for strengthening community-university partnerships
By David D. Hart, Bridie McGreavy, Anthony Sutton, Gabrielle V. Hillyer and Darren J. Ranco
In an increasingly polarized world, how can partnerships between communities and universities strengthen the kinds of deliberative and democratic practices that might help address many local and global challenges? How can such partnerships improve practices that involve listening and responding across differences (the deliberative part)? How can they help find ways to make shared decisions and take joint actions, knowing that complete agreement or mutual understanding may never be possible (the democratic part)?
Institutionalizing evidence-informed policy-making in Latin America and the Caribbean / Institucionalizando la toma de decisiones informadas por evidencias en Latinoamérica y el Caribe/ Institucionalizando a formulação de políticas informadas em evidências na América Latina e Caribe
By Directors and Coordinators of the Latin American and the Caribbean Evidence Hub
A Spanish version and a Portuguese version of this post are available
How is the routine use of evidence in policy in Latin America and the Caribbean progressing? How is it being institutionalized?
We provide a brief history of key initiatives to institutionalize evidence-informed policy making mechanisms in the region.
Highlighted contributions
Theory U: A promising journey to embracing unknown unknowns
By Vanesa Weyrauch
How can we best live in a VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous) world? How can we shift from a worldview that looks to predict and control what is to be done through plans and strategies to being present and flexible in order to respond effectively as unexpected changes take place? How can we be open to not knowing what will emerge and embrace uncertainty as the opportunity to co-create and learn?
One powerful and promising way forward is Theory U, a change methodology developed by Otto Scharmer and illustrated below. Scharmer introduced the concept of “presencing”—learning from the emerging future. The concept of “presencing” blends “sensing” (feeling the future possibility) and “presence” (the state of being in the present moment). It acknowledges that we don’t know the answers. Staying at the bottom of the U until the best potential future starts emerging requires embracing uncertainty as fertile soil.
Finding expertise in research integration and implementation to tackle complex problems
By Gabriele Bammer
When you are pulling together a team to tackle a complex societal or environmental problem, where can you find the expertise to deal with:
- Research integration challenges such as: deciding which disciplines and stakeholders to include, setting limits around the problem, dealing with competing problem definitions, managing intractable unknowns, and synthesising different perspectives?
- Research implementation challenges such as: identifying likely change agents, taking context into account, developing tools and processes for research to support more effective actions to ameliorate the problem?
Currently there is no one place to find all this expertise, but there are two major groups who can contribute parts of it:
Scaffolding transdisciplinary contributions
By Roderick Lawrence
What do we mean by “scaffolding” and how is it used in transdisciplinary research?
Scaffolding is a metaphor transferred from building construction and used in pedagogy and teaching methods since the 1970s to assist learning processes. This metaphor has also been applied to multi-stakeholder processes that require collective decision making about complex societal challenges including conflictual situations. In this context scaffolding is used in deliberative processes, identifying those constituents that require facilitation, and selecting the appropriate methods and tools to achieve desired outcomes.
Scaffolding is increasingly recognized as necessary to assist bridge building between people, especially in transdisciplinary research and project implementation about complex situations and persistent problems that have no simple solutions.
Practical actions for fostering cross-disciplinary research
By Yan Ding, Justin Pulford, Susie Crossman and Imelda Bates
2. Justin Pulford (biography)
3. Susie Crossman (biography)
4. Imelda Bates (biography)
How can we facilitate cross-disciplinary research in practice? What practical actions are considered important for participating in cross-disciplinary research? How do these actions change at the individual, research team/programme and institutional/funder level?
Cross-disciplinary research approaches allow for the interchange of knowledge and experience to stimulate innovative responses to complex research challenges.
Individual researchers
The individual researcher requires certain personal attributes for effective participation in cross-disciplinary research.