Transdisciplinary Concepts and Methods
Project:
Transdisciplinary Cognitive Integration
Project head:
Dr. Thomas Jahn
Prof. Dr. Egon Becker
Project team:
all members of ISOE
Duration :
05/2001-03/2006
Funding:
Federal Ministry of Education and Research
funding
programme Social Ecological Research
Egon Becker, Thomas Jahn (Hg.) (2006): Social Ecology. Grundzüge einer
Wissenschaft von den gesellschaftlichen Naturverhältnissen. Campus Verlag:
Frankfurt, New York (German) more
Jahn, Thomas (2006): Social Ecology, kognitive Integration und Transdisciplinarity. In:Technikfolgenabschätzung - Theorie und Praxis, Nr. 2, 14. Jahrgang, 32-38 (pdf-file, 280 kb).
Forschungsgruppe Soziale Ökologie FSÖ (Hg.) (1987): Soziale Ökologie. Gutachten zur Förderung der sozial-ökologischen Research in Hessen. Erstellt im Auftrag der Hessischen Landesregierung. Researchsgruppe Social Ecology. Frankfurt am Main (German: pdf-file, 1,8 MB)
Transdisciplinary Cognitive Integration
How is it possible in a transdisciplinary institute to develop a common, cross-disciplinary and cross project knowledge base? How can one make methodological "tacit knowledge" explicit? How does one go about renewing the foundations of the institute’s research work, while at the same time passing this foundation on to new members? And how can all of this be stored in a form that is accessible to researchers outside the institute?
The project, "Transdisciplinary Cognitive Integration", experimented with a special form of internal exchange among researchers at the institute. Therefore all researchers of the institute took part in the project. They were supported by external specialists
Based on the fundamental considerations of the survey to promote social-ecological research within the state of Hesse from 19871 the existing programme and the methods of Social Ecology were examined, critically assessed and further devoloped. Within this process new parts of knowledge from the running research practice have been integrated. At the same time, forms of institute-internal knowledge transfers were being introduced to make it easier for new members to appropriate the institute’s core competencies and programme.
The project has been critically important for ISOE as a theory-guided research institute, helping it attain an intellectual "capacity building" internally and a clear positioning externally. The theoretical placement of the institute was reviewed in the course of this process. Moreover the project aimed at the improvement of the ability to cooperate with other research institutions, including those with fixed disciplinary approaches. At long term, sustainable improvement in cognitive and social integration processes, and the establishment of structures supporting their continuity, are indispensable not only for the desired further development of the institute but also more widely for a positive development of European research as a whole.
Regurlarly held colloquiums as a basis for a continious knowledge exchange, a lecture series with external guests, workshops and discussions on structured presentations on different research topics and principle terms and moreover the common work on an introduction to Social Ecology characterized the work within the project. In addition, the researchers were enabled to work on the conceptual and methodical problems beyond the project and could therefore gain various learning experiences.
In spring 2006 the book "Soziale Ökologie. Grundzüge einer Wissenschaft von den gesellschaftlichen Naturverhältnissen" has been published.
The project was funded within the infrastructure funding of the funding programme Social-Ecological Research of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research.
1 Forschungsgruppe Soziale Ökologie FSÖ (Hg.) (1987): Soziale Ökologie. Gutachten zur Förderung der sozial-ökologischen Forschung in Hessen. Erstellt im Auftrag der Hessischen Landesregierung. Forschungsgruppe Soziale Ökologie. Frankfurt am Main
Publications
Egon Becker, Thomas Jahn (Hg.) (2006): Soziale Ökologie. Grundzüge einer Wissenschaft von den gesellschaftlichen Naturverhältnissen. Campus Verlag: Frankfurt, New York, ISBN-13 978-3-593-37993-7
Jahn, Thomas/Florian Keil (2004): Social-Ecological Research: A New Approach towards Generating, Integrating and Transferring Knowledge for Sustainable Development: In: Kolleg für Management und Gestaltung nachhaltiger Entwicklung gGmbH (Hg.): European Networks Conference on Sustainability in Practice 2004, conference Reader. Berlin (130 kb pdf-file)
Becker, E./ Th. Jahn (2003): Umrisse einer kritischen Theorie gesellschaftlicher Naturverhältnisse. In: Böhme, Gernot / Manzei, Alexandra (Hg.), Kritische Theorie der Technik und der Natur. München: Wilhelm Fink, 91-112
Becker, E. (2003): Soziale Ökologie: Konturen und Konzepte einer neuen Wissenschaft. In: Matschonat, Gunda / Gerber, Alexander (Hg.), Wissenschaftstheoretische Perspektiven für die Umweltwissenschaften. Weikersheim: Margraf Publishers, 165-195