Enablers of transdisciplinary collaboration for researchers working on climate risks in African cities
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12950844 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Alice McClure (0000-0003-1222-2025, University of Cape Town, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2023 |
| Volume | 19 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 259-273 |
| Publication date | 2023-11-11 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Sustainability Science (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1862-4057 • E-ISSN: 1862-4065 |
| Publisher | Springer Science+Business Media (PUBLISHER • DE) |
| DOI | 10.1007/s11625-023-01426-w |
| OpenAlex | W4388591532 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
| References cited | 49 |
This study explores enablers that help researchers to undertake collaborative transdisciplinary work with non-academic actors to co-produce knowledge on complex climate risks in African cities. Enablers were explored using a qualitative case study approach and expansive learning theory, which emphasises the embeddedness of practices in cultural and historical contexts. Concepts associated with expansive learning helped to consider relational enablers, namely: (i) capabilities required by researchers to understand the perspectives, values and motives of non-academic actors and make their own explicit; (ii) characteristics of spaces that allowed diverse participants to engage with perspectives, values and motives of others; and (iii) knowledge of the motivation behind different practices of non-academic actors, as embedded in different contexts. Findings highlight the importance of researchers’ intentional efforts to engage non-academic actors in their city contexts and respond to local priorities. Design elements that enabled relational work included explicit co-production framings, sharing experiences and opportunities for understanding various actor groups through structured activities and informal dialogues. The study highlights the situated and dialectical relationship between growing relational capabilities of researchers and their engagement in transdisciplinarity, provided spaces were created for reflection on activities. Relational enablers helped researchers to understand the heterogeneous experiences of actors working in African cities and tensions that influence their practices including traditional knowledge paradigms and siloed ways of working. The “champions” identified by researchers were those non-academic actors who took agency to engage with these tensions and begin transforming their practices towards multi-actor transdisciplinary knowledge co-production
Agency (philosophy · Embeddedness · Expansive · Knowledge management · Political science · Public relations · Situated · Social science · Sociology · Transdisciplinarity · Innovative Approaches in Technology and Social Development · Interdisciplinary Research and Collaboration · Sustainability and Climate Change Governance
The Routledge Handbook on Cities of the Global South
The Sage Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods
The Ecology of Team Science
Co-production and collaboration in planning – The difference
Building common knowledge at the boundaries between professional practices
“Vygotsky’s Neglected Legacy”
Studies of expansive learning
Grasping the dynamic complexity of team learning
Becoming Transdisciplinary
Global Change and the Ecology of Cities
From mediated actions to heterogenous coalitions
Pathways for resilience to climate change in African cities
Understanding and supporting climate-sensitive decision processes in southern African cities
Transdisciplinary research in sustainability science
The real type and ideal type of transdisciplinary processes
Preparing Emerging Doctoral Scholars for Transdisciplinary Research
Exploring the role of transdisciplinary learning for navigating climate risks in African cities
Embedded researchers as transdisciplinary boundary spanners strengthening urban climate resilience
A reflection on the relational aspects of research policy interfaces
Qualitative methods 1
African urbanisation at the confluence of informality and climate change
What is progress in transdisciplinary research
Beginning at the end
Qualitative Data Analysis
Adventures in transdisciplinary learning
Adopting a Grounded Theory Approach to Cultural-Historical Research
| Unique citing works | 4 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 2 |
| Citation span | 2024 - 2026 (3) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 3 |