Creating Inspiring Workshops and Courses in Transdisciplinarity: A Guide - Manual / Resource - Page 84
Theory of change
The problem-focused starting point for transdisciplinary
research is strongly paired with an action-orientation; that
is, TD researchers are not just concerned with understanding
complex societal or socio-ecological challenges (although that is
usually a key component of TDR), they are also about changing
or improving the problematic situation or issue. Conventional
research approaches tend to make strong and often simplistic
assumptions about change – that building new knowledge and
publishing peer-reviewed papers will automatically generate
change. But experience shows that this is rarely the case. Change
processes are multi-faceted, political, and often face resistance
from incumbent interests and powers.
Theory of change (ToC) is a structured approach to identifying
the proposed causal links between a project or intervention
and their goals, and unpacking the assumptions those involved
make about how research will actually generate that change.
ToC emerged from the development sector, where many wellintended projects were found to not lead to substantial gains in
the areas they were intended to affect, ToC frameworks guide
researchers and practitioners through a series of questions or
considerations about how change is expected to happen. It is
not a theory in the scientific sense; rather, theory of change is a
process and framework for identifying participants’ rationales
for expected pathways to change. By engaging in structured
conversations about expectations, ideas, and intentions for
change, a TDR team can surface important and often diverse,
implicit, or unspoken assumptions about how change happens.
They can check those assumptions against others’ experiences
and develop a shared vision, understanding of causality, and
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more sophisticated strategies and mechanisms that can be
fostered for the best opportunity for positive actions.
While there are many variations, a typical project-based ToC
approach will include:
1. Establishing a shared vision for the intended and desired
change (the end point).
2. Reflecting on the time, energy, resource inputs for a
project (the starting point).
3. Specifying the activities of the TDR that will generate
outputs and the logical, causal links among inputs,
activities, and outputs.
4. Considering how outputs will lead to outcomes, and
whether these outcomes logically follow.
5. Establishing the rationale for how outcomes are
contributing to the realization of the vision.
ToC processes are best done as a team process and can include
societal actors even if they are not part of the immediate
project team. At every step of the process, the team needs to
identify significant assumptions and assess their plausibility.
As a team process, ToC can clarify the scale or extent of
intended change (is it incremental, adaptive, transformative?),
test the robustness of the logic underpinning how the planned
activities will support that change (does the project need to do
more to engage influential actors in the system?), assess any
preconditions that may need to be in place to achieve change
(are assumptions reasonable?), and be used to reflect on the
effectiveness of strategies or need for adjustment as more
information or experience is gained through the project (are
Practices Theory of change
