Translating Transformations
Improving transdisciplinary transformative change initiatives by promoting critical social science literacy
Mission
Our mission is to co-design literacy tools and strategies that empower both critical social scientists (CSS) in teaching structural power dynamics and Transdisciplinary Transformative Change Initiatives (TTCIs) in integrating these concepts into their solutions. By creating a central, open-access platform, we aim to distribute these tools widely, fostering deeper engagement with critical social science.
Vision
We envision a world where critical social science (CSS) is better integrated into transformative change initiatives.
Our goals are to:
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Create awareness around alternative ways of framing the problem
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Improve understandings of CSS's role in promoting better synchronicity among research, policy, and practice
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Make CSS more accessible
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Boost understandings of how to bridge the gap between critical social theory and practice
About the Project.
Fundamental societal change is urgently needed to address the global crises of climate change, biodiversity loss, political instability, and growing social inequality. Many initiatives have attempted to spark this change, but most miss a key ingredient: a critical perspective on the power relations that drive the interrelated crises.
Our research project aims to fill this critical gap by providing a platform that facilitates a better understanding and integration of critical social theory into transdisciplinary transformative change initiatives (TTCI).
In this project, we take two Swiss-based biodiversity and global change initiatives (ValPar.CH and URPP-GCB) as our starting point. Using the lessons learned from (not) dealing with structural power dynamics in these initiatives, we are co-developing tools to assist with understanding and integrating critical social theory in future initiatives.
Transdisciplinary Transformative Change Initiatives (TTCI)
Transformative Change (TC)
Our understanding of TC is grounded in the definition provided by the IPBES: “A fundamental, system-wide reorganization across technological, economic and social factors, including paradigms, goals and values.” (IPBES, 2019: XVIII)
Understanding the Challenge of Transdisciplinary Collaborations
Although transformative change is now widely acknowledged as being best supported through transdisciplinary collaborations, transdisciplinary transformative change initiatives (TTCIs) rarely achieve the paradigmatic effects they aim to deliver.
What are transdisciplinary collaborations?
Transdisciplinary collaborations are those among academic and non-academic stakeholders.
The Problem: Narrow Problem Framing
A major cause of this failure has been identified as a lack of understanding of alternative framings of the problem, resulting in disjointed and incoherent strategizing. In other words, due to the different ‘languages’ understood by participants in TTCIs, such initiatives rarely achieve common understandings of the myriad ways in which the problem they seek to address can be framed. This leads to a narrow framing of the problem and, therefore, incomplete solutions.
What do we mean by “framing the problem”?
Framing the problem refers to the way a problem is understood and addressed and can vary as in the following examples: Is the problem that humans are all inherently selfish and greedy? Or…Is our socioeconomic system the problem? Or…Is the problem that societal institutions reward particular types of behavior? Or…Is the problem due to the loss of an understanding of interconnectedness among humans and the rest of nature? Or…
The Role of Critical Social Science: A Missing Piece in the Puzzle
While TTCIs have had success in reaching common understandings of the problem among natural scientists and non-academic partners, the role of social science perspectives continues to elude such initiatives. And while some forms of social science (e.g. psychology, economics) are increasingly successfully integrated, alternative knowledge communities, including critical social scientists continue to find themselves on the outside of TTCIs.
In what ways are psychology and economics better integrated?
i.e. their problem framing supports those of natural science.
What do critical social scientists do?
Critical social scientists use critical theoretical perspectives on structural knowledge/power dynamics and their causal links with socio-ecological problems