Latest contribution
Transdisciplinarity in education: Aligning conceptualisation, configuration and competencies
By Hussein Zeidan.
How can we move from broad visions of transdisciplinarity to concrete educational practices that students can meaningfully engage with? What kinds of course designs genuinely support learning in complex, real‑world settings? And how do we ensure clarity, for both students and educators, about what these courses are meant to achieve?
These questions sit at the heart of many conversations among educators seeking to bring transdisciplinarity into their teaching practice. We want students to learn how to navigate complex problems, draw on multiple ways of knowing and develop the mindsets that allow them to work across boundaries with confidence. Yet the very flexibility that makes transdisciplinarity appealing can also make it difficult to design courses that are clear, supportive and aligned.
In practice, ‘transdisciplinarity in education’ has become an umbrella for diverse pedagogical approaches that immerse students in the complexity of real‑world problems. Educators frequently repurpose methods such as problem‑based learning, challenge‑based learning and service learning. These strategies are valuable, but the assumption that they alone can develop all the knowledge, skills, and dispositions needed to navigate complex problems warrants revisiting and rethinking.
Recent contributions
The essential conditions for, and characteristics of, complexity
By Jean Boulton.
What are the underpinning necessities or conditions—the essential ingredients—that lead to and engender the qualities or characteristics of the complex world, especially its processual and emergent nature?
Three conditions for complexity: the essential ingredients
A watch or intricate machine is not complex. Nor is a saucer of water. So, when do we regard something as complex? What are the necessary conditions for complexity fully to be realised?
These are:
- open boundaries
- diversity
- reflexive inter-relationships among constituents.
Let’s look at each of these in more detail.
A communication framework for public engagement and impact
By Judith Friedlander and Tania Leimbach.
2. Tania Leimbach (biography)
How can researchers cut through ‘the infoglut’ to share their findings with communities? What communication strategies help raise the agenda of critical issues to drive impactful advocacy and action?
As researchers and practitioners, we want to better understand how to effectively frame critical issues in a hybrid media system, facilitate media uptake and engage the public in scalable change-making. To this end, we developed the MAVEN communication framework, which consists of:
- Meta-frames (developing overarching concepts);
- Actions and Applications (supporting local pilots and scalability);
- Values (identifying shared community values and news values);
- Evidence and Ethos (messaging from reputable stakeholders), and
- News media (disseminating information within a hybrid media system).
Five structural levers to reopen feedback loops that are resistant to external evidence
By Lachlan S. McGill.
When feedback loops have become resistant to external evidence, what are some potential ways of intervening to reopen them?
This i2Insights contribution builds on my previous post which covers understanding why feedback loops can become resistant to external evidence and how to diagnose such a structural problem.
Here I introduce five structural ways to intervene in such a closed feedback loop. These are structural levers, each targeting a different aspect of how signals flow, how authority is allocated, and how evaluative standards are defined.
One practical note before beginning. Applying the interventions below often requires institutional authority, coalition building, or regulatory support, so that isolated actors may not be able to deploy them fully, leaving the problematic dominant structure intact. The five levers describe what structural intervention looks like but are not a guarantee that it will succeed.
Understanding and diagnosing when feedback loops become resistant to external evidence
By Lachlan S. McGill.
Why does better evidence sometimes fail to improve decision making? How can we tell if this is caused by feedback loops becoming resistant to external evidence?
Understanding how structural patterns become problematic
In most organisations, decisions are embedded in feedback loops that connect indicators, incentives, and authority structures. These loops determine what counts as success, which signals influence decisions, and how performance is evaluated over time.
When feedback loops are well aligned with system goals, they support learning. However, feedback loops can also evolve in ways that reinforce a narrow definition of success. This is generally associated with a system relying on a small number of indicators to guide decisions. Common examples include financial return on investment, productivity or output measures, growth targets, publication counts or grant income, and compliance indicators.
Highlighted contributions
A practical framework for transforming academia through inter- and transdisciplinarity / Un marco práctico para transformar el mundo académico mediante la interdisciplinariedad y la transdisciplinariedad
By Bianca Vienni Baptista and Danilo Streck
2. Danilo Streck (biography)
A Spanish version of this post is available.
How can the role of inter- and transdisciplinarity be re-imagined at higher education institutions?
This i2Insights contribution presents a practical framework developed with Julie Thompson Klein and based on fifteen case studies from Asia, Africa, Australia, Europe, Latin America, and North America that described how inter- and transdisciplinarity have been institutionalised in higher education.
Our framework is a practical tool that offers a means to rethink or imagine how interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary initiatives are (or will be) embedded in institutions and with which purposes.
Six lessons for connecting evidence to policy and practice in the Global South
By Fréjus Thoto
How can the ecosystem of evidence use in policy and practice work better in Global South countries such as Benin?
Here I provide six lessons drawn from activities undertaken by the African Center for Equitable Development (ACED), a non-profit think-and-do tank, located in Benin, West Africa. Our focus has been on the food and nutrition security sector.
Lesson 1: Access to policy-relevant evidence is still a big challenge
There is still much work to do in order to ensure that timely and policy-relevant evidence is produced and accessible to users. We have developed a national platform to consolidate and display the available statistical data, research findings, and evaluation findings. However, a platform alone is not enough, and research agenda setting, research-policy dialogues and other strategic activities are required.
Lesson 2: Involve governments at all levels in evidence-informed policymaking processes
Inclusive Systemic Thinking for transformative change
By Ellen Lewis and Anne Stephens
2. Anne Stephens (biography)
What is Inclusive Systemic Thinking and how can it be effective in achieving transformational change? How can it contribute to a more inclusive and equitable world?
Introducing Inclusive Systemic Thinking
We have coined the term Inclusive Systemic Thinking to describe an approach that is influenced by a field of systems thinking called ‘Critical Systems Thinking,’ as well as by the social and behavioural sciences, fourth-wave feminism, and more recently, our work in the global development sector. Inclusive Systemic Thinking uses the ‘GEMs’ framework for complex systemic intersectional analysis based on: Gender equality/equity (non-binary), Environments (natural and/or contextual) and Marginalised voices (human and non-human). We described the GEMS framework in a recent i2Insights contribution, A responsible approach to intersectionality.
In our work, Inclusive Systemic Thinking is inclusive because we actively reflect on, advocate, mentor, and adapt our practices through an ethos of engagement that is widespread and that uses non-conventional approaches.
A pattern language for knowledge co-creation
By Yuko Onishi
How can pattern language be used to share tips for knowledge co-creation in transdisciplinary research? What is pattern language?
Pattern language
Pattern language is an idea that originated in the field of architecture and city planning in the 1970s. The American architect Christopher Alexander and his colleagues created a common language, referred to as pattern language, that can be used by non-experts to participate in the process of city planning and building design.
In this pattern language, the rules of thumb for solving common and timeless problems in design are summarised in units called ‘patterns.’ Each pattern describes a specific problem, the situation or context in which it likely occurs, and the core of the solution to that problem.
The solutions are not written as specific procedures or manuals, but rather as ‘hints’ for solving the problem. Therefore, the solution can be used in many ways based on one’s own needs and situation.