Creating Inspiring Workshops and Courses in Transdisciplinarity: A Guide - Manual / Resource - Page 83
Identify actors, roles, and expectations
Setting goals collectively and managing expectations
Collectively agreeing on the societal issue to work on, a desired
vision for the future, and on concrete but flexible project goals
and research questions are central to transdisciplinary research.
These are not just scientific tasks but rather negotiation
processes among researchers and their societal partners.
The purpose of TDR is to develop evidence-based knowledge
for improving problematic societal situations, dynamics, or
trends. However, not everyone who knows about the problem, is
affected by it, or has the power to change it necessarily has the
same understanding of what the problem actually is. TDR brings
actors with relevant points of view and expertise to the table to
discuss and agree on a shared understanding of the problem at
hand. Plurality of interests, access to (or lack of) knowledge, or
unstructured information need to be considered in this process.
Developing a joint understanding of the problem goes hand-inhand with discussing underlying values and developing a shared
idea of what should be achieved: a vision for the future. With
this shared vision, participants acknowledge that what they
collectively declare to be good or desired is a value judgment
or a political position that they make explicit (see Normativity
page 92). Project participants can either agree on such a vision,
or decide that things are more complicated and that studying
opinions about a desirable future should be an additional part
of the research. The latter is referred to as developing “target
knowledge.” Alternatively, the project can refer to an existing
vision of a local community, political body, or society at large.
Project goals are then set collectively based on this broader
vision. For sustainable development, this approach can be done
in accordance with a respective politically legitimized concept,
such as the UN 2030 Agenda.
Practices Setting goals and expectations
Proper goal-setting and explicit, upfront structuring of envisioned
outcomes are central to the conception, design, implementation,
and evaluation of transdisciplinary projects. A “theory of change”
approach can be used to describe the underlying assumptions
on how a transdisciplinary research project may lead to specific
outcomes and impacts (see Theory of change, page 79). Since
much can change over the course of a project, project goals need
to be reviewed iteratively throughout the process.
Further reading:
•
Mitchell, Cynthia, Dana Cordell, and Dena Fam. 2015.
Beginning at the End: The Outcome Spaces Framework
to Guide Purposive Transdisciplinary Research. Futures 65
(January): 86–96.
•
Pohl, Christian, Pius Krütli, and Michael Stauffacher. 2017.
Ten Reflective Steps for Rendering Research Societally
Relevant. Gaia 26 (1): 43–51.
•
Wuelser, Gabriela. 2014. Towards Adequately Framing
Sustainability Goals in Research Projects: The Case of
Land Use Studies. Sustainability Science 9 (3): 263–76.
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