Consulting versus participatory transdisciplinarity: A refined classification of transdisciplinary research

This paper analyses transdisciplinarity and discusses the conceptual changes it has undergone during the past decade. Transdisciplinarity is currently perceived as an extended knowledge production including a variety of actors and with an open perception of the relevance of different forms of scientific and lay knowledge. By stressing scope of collaboration, a clearer distinction can be established between interdisciplinarity and transdisciplinarity than was possible with the former focus on degree of integration. However, integration is still an essential feature of transdisciplinarity and in emphasising the need to acknowledge the different roles actors can play in knowledge production a distinction can be identified between two different forms of transdisciplinarity; consulting versus participatory transdisciplinarity. This distinction draws upon the qualitative difference between research conducted including all kinds of actors on equal terms in the knowledge production process (participatory transdisciplinarity) or having actors from outside academia responding and reacting to the research conducted (consulting transdisciplinarity). Both forms fulfil the basic requirements of transdisciplinarity but differ regarding the challenges involved, and thus a distinction needs to be made between them when discussing, commissioning or evaluating research.     

The new Capital Accord and banks’ lending decisions

Capital requirements (‘pillar one’ of the new Capital Accord) rising with the increase in borrowers’ PDs were thought as being likely: (i) to have a serious impact on the financing of small and medium-sized enterprises (usually riskier than large corporates) and (ii) to increase the procyclicality of the supply of credit.

The aim of this paper is to provide an empirical evaluation of the possible impact of the new Accord proposals on the lending policies of Italian banks. We compare the interest rate charged to a large set of Italian firms with the cost brought about by the change in the calculation of capital requirements. Since the two variables move together in response to an increase in borrowers’ PDs, we conclude that the new regulatory approach to measuring capital adequacy appears consistent with banks’ own risk evaluations. This result is supported by a ‘stress testing’ exercise: the relationship also holds in a distressed economic scenario, which replicates the financial conditions of the Italian corporate sector in the 1993–1994 recession.     

Technological trajectories and R&D for environmental innovation in UK firms

This article reports results of a 1993 questionnaire survey of how UK companies have been innovating technologically in response to environmental pressures. The survey sought to identify factors stimulating UK firms to innovate more environmentally friendly products and processes, and to investigate the changes in R&D activity they have undertaken to facilitate such innovation. In devising the questionnaire and interpreting the results, we have been strongly influenced by the theoretical frameworks developed over the past 15 years which describe technological developments in terms of ‘selection environments’ and ‘technological trajectories’. Useful though such frameworks are, we conclude that they need to be supplemented by concepts derived from the sociology of technology and from studies of corporate strategies.     

Trapped between privileges and precariousness: Tracing transdisciplinary research in a postcolonial setting

In its conception, transdisciplinarity turns its back on traditional academic knowledge production valuing different bodies of knowledge to be of relevance for the issue at hand regardless of their discipline or academic education. The question of how transdisciplinary practise can manage to break with existing structures to realize its envisaged co-production is hardly addressed, however, crucial acknowledging inherent power dynamics. Using a transdisciplinary project as a case study, we picture the structures that position those involved regarding their influence on and benefit of (a) the research setup, (b) resource allocations, (c) project discourses, (d) project output and (e) decision-making and steering. By combining quantitative with qualitative data, we reveal the herein materialised power imbalances between social and natural sciences, academic degrees, science and society and, in our specific setup, between the Global North and South. Our results indicate a pervasive reproduction of hierarchical, academic, postcolonial knowledge orders that make doing transdisciplinarity a privilege for some, although not without risk. In conclusion, we emphasise the high need for, first, serious attempts of self-critical processes of reflexivity in transdisciplinary practise and, second, a fundamental reorientation in the academic and funding system in order to challenge existing knowledge hegemonies.     

South Asia: Before and after

Ever since the two-pronged ‘divide and rule’ approach of the British and the ‘two nation’ theory of the communal forces led to the partition of the subcontinent, the elites of South Asian countries have always bifurcated the region's modern history with the independence divider. The contemporary period thus comprises of ‘before 1947’ when the British themselves ruled, and ‘after 1947’ when British ideas rule. Demystifying the all too familiar ‘before and after’ analysis of the elites and their pompous claims of post-independence ‘achievements’, this paper attempts to elude that scheme, exposing the emptiness of such claims. The author exhorts the poor of South Asia to put independence behind them as another major political event in the long history of the region and to press ahead with collective preparations for their common futures.     

New leaders shine light on shadow of denial

At first glance, I was quite sure that I wanted to take on Don Michael's 1991 Futures essay—‘Leadership's shadow: the dilemma of denial’. My initial glimpse suggested that he was advocating that we might ‘hope’ our problems away in the absence of any proven strategy for action. It was with this interpretation that I agreed to respond to an invitation to submit an essay for this colloquium as a reaction to his original article. However, after reading the article more carefully in preparation for writing my response, I was impressed with the foresight Michael demonstrated, given that he offered it for publication in late 1990 which meant he had written it some time earlier.     

Domestic futures and sustainable residential development

Domestic ‘futures’ have been a long time coming. This paper questions the extent to which futuristic ‘vision’ linked to the rhetoric and sentiment of ‘sustainable development’ and the ‘livable city’ inform town and regional planning in England and Canada. Despite official commitment to ‘environmental’ objectives and media interest in ‘ecotech’ residential development, markets institutions and behaviour lag behind what is technically possible. Planning guidance encourages homes with less environmental impact. But this message has not reached most residential consumers. Is lack of mass markets in low impact housing a flaw in Government regulation, evidence of the cynical nature of official rhetoric, or proof of gradual product development as society redefines what is expected of living spaces? Or is it unwise to expect too much change in attitudes to property, or for innovation to come soon?     

Human-centred CIM : Informating the design/manufacturing interface

The work design philosophy embodied in the human-centred computer integrated manufacturing (CIM) approach provides a radical alternative to traditional technology-oriented and Taylorist approaches to CIM. In order to extend the work that has been done on redesigning factory production and planning tools and systems, this approach can usefully be enhanced by drawing on research on ‘simultaneous engineering’ and the technical and organizational redesign of the design/manufacturing interface. The vision of the ‘informated’ factory of the future embodied in this human-centred CIM vision provides a much needed challenge to traditional guiding images of the ideal automated factory.     

Economics, equity and sustainable development

As a fashionable catchword, ‘sustainable development’ has provoked a large but nebulous literature. In the interests of communication and relevance it is necessary to narrow down the various definitions that have been given and show how a revised conception of sustainable development can be integrated into practical decisionmaking. This article suggests one approach. Sustainable development is categorized by economic change subject to ‘constancy of the natural capital stock’—the stock of environmental assets is held constant while the economy is allowed whatever social goals are deemed appropriate. Such a rule, which has its own difficulties, accommodates the main concerns of the advocates of sustainability—equity between generations, equity within a generation, economic resilience to external shocks, and uncertainty about the functions and values of natural environments in social systems. It may also accommodate some of the concerns of the ‘deep ecology’ movement by respecting rights in nature.     

Telework remains ‘made to measure’ The large-scale introduction of telework in the Netherlands

About 25% of all jobs in the Netherlands can be done in telework. We cannot give a quantitative overview of the costs and benefits of telework, partly due to the ‘made to measure’ quality of telework projects, but a qualitative overview shows that overall telework will be beneficial both on the micro and macro level, provided its introduction is voluntarily for all involved. The main barrier to the introduction is that organizations do not know enough about the implementation process. Considering the differences between organizations, a large-scale introduction of telework can be stimulated by creating a large variety of telework examples. Telework will have to remain ‘made to measure’.     

Making rights from what’s left of Darwinism

The legal, political, and social meaning of the work of Charles Darwin has been claimed as resident to conservative and liberal homes alike. Peter Singer's unique admixture of personal liberal politics and what may look to be an extremely conservative philosophy of nature expose some over-simplicity in traditional ‘right’ and ‘left’ categories. In “Recovering the Left from Darwin in the 21st Century”, Steve Fuller provides us with insightful historical and sociological contexts for Singer's challenges. In this article, Kirk Junker takes one aspect of the trajectory ‘the notion of natural rights’ and examines their social construction, linguistic maintenance, and legal ramifications.     

A rose by any other name? Transdisciplinarity in the context of UK research policy

This paper assesses developments in transdisciplinary research in the UK. While we support the thesis that transdisciplinarity is still not mainstream and is rarely supported per se by funders of research, this paper examines the extent to which UK research policy has embraced the concept of transdisciplinarity. Five empirical case studies provide data about the interrelationship between the interdisciplinary and impact or knowledge exchange aspirations of Research Council UK (RCUK) investments. We find evidence that, to an extent, UK research funding policy is achieving some elements of transdisciplinarity in practice, if not in name.Drawing on broader debates about the limitations of knowledge mobilisation and the challenges of conducting interdisciplinary research, we reflect on how the situation has changed since our original 2004 paper. The evidence suggests that the absence of the ‘transdisciplinary’ label is not necessarily impeding the framing of research funding schemes oriented towards societal issues. Nevertheless, several areas where capacity-building is required, including training for early career interdisciplinary researchers; improved research leadership skills; and the capacity to evaluate the quality of transdisciplinary processes and to learn from such evaluations, are identified.     

A post-nationalist South Asia

The ideas of ‘nation’, ‘national security’ and ‘development’ have played havoc with South Asian cultures. The notion of ‘nation state’ has tended to reproduce aspirations of the majority people who are often reconstructed by alien categories and leads to the alienation of minority communities. Virtually all ethnic conflicts in South Asia have their roots in this idea. A more viable and desirable future for South Asia lies in rethinking the model of development and reinventing the notions of state and security.     

Socioeconomic paradigms: Present situation and prospects

This article reviews the major socioeconomic paradigms, capitalism and communism, and their tentative ‘compromise’, social democracy, and considers the emerging green perspective and Japanese ‘managed society’ model in the context of the information age. The different kinds of crisis that each is suffering, and the dangers and opportunities arising from the crisis are analysed and discussed.     

Betraying a futurist: The misappropriation of Gandhi''s Ramarajya

Discussing how a political futurist may envision present-tainted ‘realist’ futures, ideology-oriented ‘ambitious’ futures, ethics-inspired ‘ideal’ futures, or other types of futures, this essay describes who an idealist-futurist is. Proving that Mahatma Gandhi is such an idealist-futurist who builds his futurism on the rock of humanistic values by relishing the good and rejecting the bad, emphasizes the futures for the weak, and insists on working for future through futureful means such as truth and non-violence, it is pointed out how Gandhi's futurism has come to be pilfered and betrayed by the brahmanical Hindu right-wing future-thieves in present-day India.     

The future of happiness

Following definitions of ‘happiness’ and ‘social development’, crossnational and temporal happiness trends are analysed to reveal whether reported happiness reflects changes in broader social conditions. The authors question whether an effective measurement of happiness can serve as an indicator of social development. In addition, the role of information in contributing to or maximizing happiness is analysed.     

It's only a paper moon

This article considers recent ‘end of history’ and ‘end of nature’ hypotheses in the context of new scientific and socioeconomic paradigms, and seeks a broader understanding of the nature of information society. Through a review of recent work on future socioeconomic and scientific and technological developments, the conservationist view is rejected in favour of ‘wise design and governance of evolution’. Planning and forecasting have a central role in this process.     

Accounting relativism: the unstable relationship between income measurement and theories of the firm

The knowledge structures underlying accounting representations are rarely investigated and usually tend to be taken for granted. As a case of the problematic knowledge foundations of accounting, we concentrate on one of the most relevant conceptual underpinnings informing the construction of the accounts—the relationship between theories of the firm, accounting theories, and income measurement. In particular we analyse and compare the ways in which this relationship has been conceived and developed in two theoretical contexts, the Italian tradition of Economia Aziendale and the US entity vs proprietary debate. Various and contradictory approaches to the concept of the firm and income calculation in these two theoretical traditions emerge. Such a conceptual variety is what we refer to as ‘accounting relativism’. This is defined here as the co-existence of different accounting representations and measurements, both of which are not objectively rankable in any conceptual hierarchy, because of the incommensurability of their basic assumptions, i.e. of their knowledge bases. This intrinsically ‘unstable’ character of accounting at a conceptual level is likely to have relevant implications, representing a major source of theoretical variety, as well as a premise for making sense of power uses of accounting within organisational settings. ©     

Artificial Intelligence,Education, and Entrepreneurship

We document an unprecedented brain drain of Artificial Intelligence (AI) professors from universities from 2004 to 2018. We find that students from the affected universities establish fewer AI startups and raise less funding. The brain-drain effect is significant for tenured professors, professors from top universities, and deep-learning professors. Additional evidence suggests that unobserved city- and university-level shocks are unlikely to drive our results. We consider several economic channels for the findings. The most consistent explanation is that professors' departures reduce startup founders' AI knowledge, which we find is an important factor for successful startup formation and fundraising.