- Email: [email protected]
Actionable knowledge and the art of engagement
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ScienceDirect Actionable knowledge and the art of engagement Katharine J Mach1,2, Maria Carmen Lemos3, Alison M Meadow4, Carina Wyborn5, Nicole Klenk6, James C Arnott3,7, Nicole M Ardoin8,9, Clare Fieseler10,11, Richard H Moss12,13, Leah Nichols14, Missy Stults15, Catherine Vaughan16 and Gabrielle Wong-Parodi9,17 What makes knowledge relevant to environmental sustainability actionable, and how can its societal impacts be evaluated? Scholars and practitioners have increasingly advocated that the traditional linear model of knowledge production, with its unidirectional flow of information from researchers to policymakers, be replaced by a new approach in which researchers and knowledge-users meaningfully interact to co-create knowledge that is actionable in decision-making. This popular model — coproduction — has advanced thinking on how to create usable knowledge. In practice, however, co-production has not been a single approach, but instead a diversity of forms of engaged research. Further, the jargon may both obfuscate governance dimensions and limit understanding of what works. Improved distinction among the different ways researchers and societal partners interact can enable attentive and effective engagement across contexts. Recognition of this diversity is necessary in advancing the processes and impacts of actionable knowledge for sustainability. Addresses 1 Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, University of Miami, Miami, FL, USA 2
Leonard and Jayne Abess Center for Ecosystem Science and Policy, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, USA 3 School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA 4 Institute of the Environment, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA 5 Luc Hoffmann Institute, Gland, Switzerland 6 Department of Physical and Environmental Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada 7 Aspen Global Change Institute, Basalt, CO, USA 8 Graduate School of Education, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA 9 Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA 10 Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA 11 National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC, USA 12 Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA 13 Joint Global Change Research Institute, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, College Park, MD, USA 14 Independent Scholar, USA 15 Office of Sustainability and Innovations, City of Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor, MI, USA 16 International Research Institute for Climate and Society, Earth Institute/Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory, New York, NY, USA 17 Department of Earth System Science, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA Corresponding author: Mach, Katharine J ([email protected]) Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37 This review comes from a themed issue on Advancing the science of actionable knowledge for sustainability Edited by James C Arnott, Katharine J Mach and Gabrielle WongParodi
Received: 07 June 2019; Accepted: 13 January 2020
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2020.01.002 1877-3435/ã 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Introduction As societies around the world grapple with increasing challenges to environmental sustainability, questions about what makes knowledge actionable, how we design and fund programs to incentivize it, and how we evaluate the outcomes of its use and societal impact are more relevant than ever. In the past few decades, scientists, practitioners, and research funders have made great strides towards a model of knowledge co-production that has been empirically shown to increase the use of knowledge in decision-making, that is, making research outputs actionable (see Jagannathan et al. and Arnott et al., this issue). However, a substantial portion of the environmental literature focusing on how to overcome barriers to knowledge use has conceptualized knowledge production and use as a dichotomy between two dominant models: one science/knowledge-driven (the loading dock) and one interaction/problem-driven (co-production). While this dichotomy may have increased attention to the importance of researcher–decision-maker interactions in creating actionable knowledge, it has also reified coproduction as the dominant path to usability [1]. Co-production is often defined as substantive interactions between producers and users of knowledge that results in knowledge that fits decisions contexts [2,3,4]. Yet how co-production happens in practice is less clear. While normatively the process of co-production is expected to create and rely on trusted iterative relationships, www.sciencedirect.com
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empirically documented descriptions of such processes are rare (see Jagannathan et al., this issue). Rather, what we find are descriptions of stakeholder workshops, the solicitation of information needs through surveys or focus groups, and the more recent practice of including potential users in research teams. But why should this matter? We contend that there are at least three crucial implications of co-production persisting as an idealized, yet also diversely and imprecisely defined concept that inevitably falls short of meeting its own standards. First, the jargon of co-production crowds out other forms of interactive science practices whose long tradition of methods, practices, and empirical research could support not only the practice of co-production itself but also different approaches to engagement of scientists and practitioners. Second, conceptualizations of co-production as intrinsically collaborative may obfuscate the role of co-production as a governance mechanism that defines who participates and who does not, what voices matter, and how decision-making may be changed as a result. Third, coproduction ideals often make evaluation and comparative analyses of what works a challenge, at times limiting our ability to better design and fund problem-driven research. From a problem-driven perspective, the goal of engaged research is to address societal challenges; creation of actionable knowledge is the means to that end. However, the pathways for impact are not always clear and there is a need to better understand the landscape of actionable knowledge production, including how other forms of engaged/ interactive science can contribute and when and how coproduction itself works and to what end. And it is also important to question when the process of co-production itself may work against the very goals that inspire the principles of engaged science, such as inclusion and diversity of ideas and justice of outcomes. To advance these interrelated themes, we explore the complexity of actionable knowledge and of co-production processes, tackling sometimes contradictory definitions and applications and building common understanding of the issues shaping the pathways between co-production and impact. First, we introduce actionable knowledge. Second, we discuss the role of co-production as a tool for governance as well as production of actionable knowledge. Third, we reflect on the diversity of existing engaged research, which can provide lessons for effective collaborations between researchers and societal partners. Pulling these threads together, we conclude with a framework for evaluating processes of actionable knowledge that attends to their context specificity and the need for equitable, meaningful interactions that produce knowledge that fits decision contexts.
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[relevance of research] in the world.” That is, such knowledge is “not only relevant to the world of practice, [but] it is the knowledge that people use to create the world” [5]. This definition builds upon earlier concepts such as Aristotelian practical knowledge and the idea of praxis, which in the social and political sciences refers to the process of reflection and action directed at the transformation of social structures [6,7]. Antonacopoulou explains that actionable knowledge illustrates the impact that scholarship can have by connecting theory and practice, knowledge and action [8]. Actionable knowledge is thereby distinct from standard scholarship by explicitly linking theory and practice. More recent re-conceptualizations of actionable knowledge have occurred in the context of sustainability and climate change adaptation science. Here, the term actionable science has been introduced and defined as involving “data, analyses, and forecasts that are sufficiently predictive, accepted, and understandable to support decision making, including capital investment decisions” [emphasis added] [9]. The embedded assumption in this definition is that the science should match management needs — but that the action will take place in a realm separate from the generation of knowledge. In this definition, science should be framed to be supportive of decision-making, but not explicitly include action. For example, Palmer argues for a focus on the “potential to inform decisions,” and moving closer to action through “improv[ing] the design or implementation of public policies” or “influenc[ing] . . . strategies and behaviors that affect the environment” [10]. Similarly, Beier et al. focus on the form of the information (e.g. data, analyses, projections) that supports decisions and guidance on the appropriate use of the information [11]. In the historic use of the term actionable knowledge, the assumption was that action was embedded within the knowledge, such as creating knowledge specifically about which management action to take and how to implement it. In more recent conceptualizations of actionable science, the action appears to occur outside of the knowledge-production process and within the realm of practice, where the science is tailored to inform an action, while not directly providing advice or details about which action to take and how. Here, there can also be a fear or possibility that decision-making and needs for action can bias or corrupt the science. These different conceptualizations of actionability may be valid and likely depend on the nature of the decision-making body. Understanding both definitions, and having the capacity to openly discuss the implications of each within a coproduction or other engagement process, can help to ensure that usable forms of knowledge and action emerge.
Actionable knowledge in principle and in practice
What is in a name: when is co-production co-production, and why should we care?
Argyris defines the term actionable knowledge as “that knowledge required to implement the external validity
In both scholarly articles and practical manuals of how to co-produce, there remain some ambiguity and variance in
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32 Advancing the science of actionable knowledge for sustainability
the ways co-production is conceptualized, but more importantly, in the ways it is put into practice. There are three root causes. First, the diverse intellectual lineage of the term ‘co-production’ includes different, but related definitions [12]. In particular, sustainability science focuses attention on co-production as a collaborative process whereby knowledge is produced in the service of generating action. By contrast, public administration and science, technology, and society (STS) studies see coproduction as the social processes and practices where action is taken. Second, there is the imprecision of concepts such as ‘meaningful interaction’ and ‘repeated iteration.’ For example, is it co-production if producers and users meet just once? Or what if intensive interaction occurs, but there is little evidence of either group changing the way it produces and uses knowledge? Third, as discussed in the next section, the difference between coproduction and other forms of engaged research remains somewhat lax.
From such experiences, there is a growing recognition that bringing producers and users of science into a collaborative process is, in itself, insufficient to ensure that the knowledge produced is actually used to inform decision-making — or that it will be inclusive or legitimate. This is particularly the case when drivers of unsustainable behaviors or the levers for change emanate across multiple scales [16]. A more explicit focus on actions and decisions taken as part of an intervention requires practitioners of co-production to ask questions about how participants are selected, whether they have the legitimacy to represent a broader group of stakeholders, whose knowledge counts, and how different knowledge claims and perceptions of evidence are reconciled. This approach requires academic practitioners of co-production to accept that more than just knowledge is being produced through these processes, and that efforts to create actionable knowledge must engage with political, value-laden, and sometimes uncomfortable questions.
Scholars of co-production in STS studies would argue that these questions do not matter since co-production cannot be parceled and counted as a process with discrete analytical steps. Co-production just is — in that knowledge simultaneously is a product and is constitutive of society. In contrast, scholarship in the more normative tradition of defining, implementing, and evaluating co-production has often argued for best practices and recommendations on how to set up co-production that works. Moving beyond these framings to focus attention on the actionability of knowledge underscores the ways knowledge production practices, collaborative or otherwise, are situated within broader socio-political contexts, and the processes through which decisions about sustainability are made. In this view, the practice of co-production is a means of changing how decisions are made by changing who is present in the knowledge-production processes.
A range of concepts and frameworks have been put forward to illustrate participation in knowledge production as a process and practice situated within broader socio-political contexts and networks. Such approaches include, for example, considering the rules and norms that formalize how knowledge is tested and deemed trustworthy [15,17], or the ways that rules and norms inform how actors engage with, and construct, spaces of participation [18]. These frameworks also attend to the role of worldviews, values, and visions in shaping participatory research practices and science–policy engagements [13,17,18,19]. And because there are different motivations underpinning participatory research practices, such as, for example, changing the types of structures that shape how decisions about the environment are made, it is important to attend to both the agency of the individuals within these participatory spaces and that which is created through mobilizing diverse perspectives and engagement practices towards a common goal. Mapping socio-political contexts in which actionable-knowledge interventions are situated can enable researchers and practitioners alike to understand how an intervention and its output are likely to generate knowledge and produce actions that are aligned with (or not) their broader context.
Focusing attention on decision-making processes brings to light the broader socio-political and institutional contexts shaping the production and use of actionable knowledge. Incentive structures and governance arrangements can hinder efforts to generate knowledge useful to and used in decision-making [13]. Beyond the usual barriers of time, funding, and capacities to engage across research and practice, there are often more pervasive institutional barriers that undermine efforts to produce actionable knowledge. For example, siloed organizations, institutional cultures, and mindsets of policy and practice can make knowledge integration difficult even when direct efforts are made to support such integration [14]. As such, efforts to engage in the production of actionable knowledge that do not understand, nor intentionally address, these barriers are likely to have limited impact. Consequently, co-production interventions should strive to balance fit with existing institutional processes in striving to change these arrangements [15]. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
Lessons from the diversity of engaged research Decades of work in developing collaborative and participatory methods provide guideposts for engaged methods in new sustainability contexts, with responsiveness to desired sustainability contributions, different knowledge forms, including stakeholders and their interests, and existing collaborations (Figure 1) [11,20,21]. For example, social science traditions of action research and participatory action research pioneered understanding of the relationship among inclusion, engagement, and social www.sciencedirect.com
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Figure 1
Diverse forms of engaged research Researchers
Contractual Provision of research & services & consulting resources
Specific stages
Origin of research question
Stakeholders
Type of relationship
Partnerships
Interaction over time
Collaborative research (e.g., action research to coproduction)
Continuous
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Diverse forms of engaged research. Approaches to engaged research differ in the origins of research questions, the types of relationships between researchers and societal partners, and the nature of interactions over time. These modes of engagement have occurred in varying contexts through time, with complementary and overlapping terms used to describe the processes.
change. Indigenous knowledge production and research processes provide key insights for well-informed and respectful cross-cultural interactions (see Box 1). Community-based participatory research in public health and medical sciences has involved practical engagement of communities for broadly impactful social change (e.g. vaccination or nutrition practices extending beyond the community in question), while translational medicine has focused on the actionability and implementation of completed research in complex decision-making contexts. Research focused on practical action has spanned use-inspired basic research, transdisciplinary research, and knowledge exchange, and the management and organizational sciences have additionally yielded lessons about organizational structures and functions, including the context of use. Assessment processes are yet another example [22], in which organized and interactive processes focus on evaluating and communicating the state of knowledge on issues relevant to and legitimate for decision-making. Finally, science-to-action initiatives or research–practice partnerships increasingly involve diverse participation (e.g. citizen science), partnerships, boundary organizations, funders, and management agencies. Across this history and in the present, modes of engagement between researchers and stakeholders reflect different degrees of stakeholder interaction across research phases, also incorporating different forms of knowledge (Figure 1) [21]. Goals include producing more usable information through interactions, extending science through the knowledge and values of nonscientists, enabling public services, building capacity within www.sciencedirect.com
governance institutions, supporting social learning, or empowering traditional knowledge systems [2]. Societally engaged research can include the contractual or the consultative domain, where researchers interact with stakeholders to test technologies or diagnose problems [11,20]; however, it also can be much more collaborative and collegial, with knowledge co-generated in partnership and interactions continuous and ongoing. The more collaborative forms of engagement aim towards co-creation of knowledge with the people who are most likely to use the knowledge in making changes in their organizations, communities, or environments. Knowledge making and decision-making can thereby continually reshape one another [2,13]. The focus in empirically documented experiences has largely been on processes of collaborative engagement, as compared to outcomes in advancing knowledge that is used. This focus can be partly explained by the temporal disconnect between engagement and actions taken and impacts realized. It also stems from engagement processes themselves being an important form of intervention, changing interactions between researchers and societies (see Section ‘What is in a name: when is co-production co-production, and why should we care?’). Within this focus, collaborative research has been distinguished in its emphasis on building relationships, acknowledging and sharing power, encouraging participation, making change in both societal and research practices, and establishing credible accounts [23]. It is driven by decisions, time managed, and rooted in processes that are inclusive, collaborative, and flexible [11,24]. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
34 Advancing the science of actionable knowledge for sustainability
Box 1 Actionable knowledge for whom and for what? The production of actionable knowledge with Indigenous communities is more than a research practice. It is a political and ethical undertaking. Co-production processes involving Indigenous peoples ought to stand out from general technical and effectiveness assessments of co-production processes because of the nature of Indigenous knowledges. As an embodied practice embedded within a worldview, Indigenous knowledge is inseparable from the sociocultural, political, legal, and other grounded, largely place-based relations and obligations that give rise to holistic knowledge systems (Latulippe and Klenk, this issue). Engaging with Indigenous peoples in co-production processes requires something different than intercultural respect, which equates Indigenous knowledge with cultural beliefs and practices. Knowledge co-production processes that mobilize Indigenous knowledges must focus on the governance value of such knowledge to Indigenous communities over and above its supplementary value to science and the global community [25]. The production process must also consider the historical legacy and ongoing challenges of colonialism in environmental science and governance, seeking to remove structural barriers to Indigenous resurgence (jurisdictional, policies, and practices); it must respect Indigenous knowledge sovereignty by strengthening the use and transmission of Indigenous knowledge by and for Indigenous peoples; it must seek out the diversity of the Indigenous knowledges that are differently composed and unevenly distributed; and foremost, it must support enabling structures for Indigenous communities’ collective capacity for self-determination [26–31]. Co-production processes involving Indigenous communities not only require making room for different ways of knowing (which is applicable to any research involving local and traditional knowledges), they also require strengthening and removing barriers to Indigenous selfdetermination and access to land, which is essential to the nourishment and flourishing of Indigenous knowledge systems (Latulippe and Klenk, this issue). If we are to decolonize the co-production of environmental knowledge production and governance capacity, fundamental changes are required in dominant research and decision-making institutions. These need to ‘move over’ to respect the rights of Indigenous communities to make plans for the future using Indigenous planning and decision-making processes that are wellinformed, culturally relevant, and respectful of human interdependence with non-humans and the environment [32].
Towards such processes, collaborative research requires specific skills and intention supported by training, efforts to ensure the research is what is needed, acknowledgment and incorporation of the responsibilities and knowledge of partners, and a committed attitude enabling collaboration. At the start, scientists ensure the interests of their partners, listen, and discuss expectations and goals, such that the partners receive identifiable benefits [3,13]. Problems and questions are defined together; data are jointly collected and analyzed and outputs cocreated, with safe spaces for error and failure critical in enabling learning. Further, collaborative research involves both scientists and stakeholders in understanding what an organization or community might want to do with the information in making change and how such support and collaboration can be continued into the future, enabling social learning beyond the end of the project. In this way, collaborative research can produce knowledge to address complex problems and also produce governance systems, recognizing different Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
knowledges and incorporating collaboration and trusted relationships [24]. These co-production interactions are often occurring within profoundly complex, adaptive, and also political science–policy and broader social– environmental systems [11,13].
Evaluating actionable-knowledge processes and impacts Different from evaluating basic research projects where outcomes and goals are clear and measurable, evaluation of projects, programs, and organizations that aim to produce actionable knowledge requires consideration of processes and principles that embrace participation, equity, and knowledge usability. These processes have implications both for the project and for program-level funding (see Box 2). Hence the goals for evaluating actionable-knowledge processes include the perspectives and voices of all participants; seek to determine whether and how actionable knowledge was produced; and identify any socio-ecological impacts that emerged because of the actionable-knowledge process. However, there are several challenges inherent to actionable knowledge and the use of knowledge in decisionmaking that we must consider when designing evaluation processes. Actionable knowledge’s context-specific nature means that it may look different depending on the places, times, and groups involved — there are no set metrics that can be applied to all actionable-knowledge processes (for example, see Box 1). Second, tracing socio-ecological impacts from research or engagement processes is on the Box 2 Funding actionable knowledge Scaling up the production of actionable knowledge requires innovation in approaches to the financial support of research. Research funding has always been linked to prevailing assumptions about how science benefits society. For example, public funding structures have historically been organized around the linear model that separates basic and applied research funding streams and, in the process, institutionalizes a form of distance between science and society [42]. Moving forward, funders are well-situated to test out and learn from alternative approaches (see Arnott et al., this issue). For example, funders can incorporate requirements for co-production into solicitations, thus stimulating researchers to adopt practices more likely to produce actionable knowledge [43–45]. Funders may engage users at multiple stages of the funding life cycle to help prioritize research questions, review proposals, and assess outcomes [46,47]. Funders may also apply their own institutional knowledge and capacity to provide forms of non-financial assistance by serving as a type of boundary organization themselves and offering other forms of training and technical assistance to projects [48]. Understanding how these types of approaches influence the production of actionable knowledge will require funders to both reimagine how they evaluate the impact of their portfolios as well as carefully attend to the issues of participation, process, and equity raised in this article. The resulting experiences from alternative approaches to funding can also provide an important opportunity for more empirical scholarship on actionable knowledge.
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Figure 2
Evaluating actionable-knowledge production Principles of producing actionable knowledge:
1. Substantive interactions
2. Equitable relationships
3. Usable knowledge
Principles-focused evaluation: 1. 2. 3.
Are these principles meaningful to participants? Did participants adhere to the principles throughout the process? Did the process lead towards the desired result? Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability
Principles-focused evaluation of actionable-knowledge production.
frontier of evaluation work. There is significant uncertainty about how and when knowledge moves from actionability, to action, to tangible impacts as the process may take years [33], often outside the timescale of evaluation. There is also uncertainty about how to determine the extent to which any impact can be attributed to any one process or piece of knowledge [34]. A promising approach to evaluating context-dependent and innovative processes, such as the production of actionable knowledge, is principles-focused evaluation (Figure 2) [35]. Principles-focused evaluation is designed to be used for projects, programs, and organizations that are innovative and for which no fixed metrics of success exist. The approach relies on the identification of core principles, which will guide participants through uncharted territory. Above we outlined the principles of producing actionable knowledge as 1) engaging in substantive interactions between producers and users of knowledge, 2) ensuring equitable relationships among parties engaged in the process, and 3) producing knowledge that is usable by decision-makers. The principles-focused evaluation approach then centers on answering three questions (Figure 2). First, are these principles meaningful to the participants? Answering this question necessitates a participatory approach as meaningfulness must be defined by all parties. It also requires that evaluation be built into the project, so that agreement on the principles can be assessed early in the process and adjustments made, if necessary. Second, did the participants adhere to the principles throughout the process? This question requires a process-evaluation approach so that the evaluator can determine whether the principles were in play throughout the www.sciencedirect.com
engagement process. Process evaluation includes examinations of how, when, and in what ways researchers and practitioners collaborated during the process; who was involved in or excluded from the process; whether power, roles, and responsibilities were shared equitably; and whether there were barriers to collaboration that affected some people’s level of engagement [4,36]. Process evaluation also provides opportunities for participants to reflect, learn, and course-correct, as necessary, during the process rather than waiting until the end to identify barriers or challenges. Third, did the process lead to desired results? Evaluation of the outputs and outcomes of an actionable-knowledge process should include participants’ perspectives on usability, including the possibility of multiple pathways to usability [37], as well as identifying and tracing both tangible and intangible uses of the knowledge or other outputs. It is important to consider a range of uses and impacts; tangible impacts may not be the most obvious or easiest to trace, due to the time-lag and attribution challenges outlined above. Meagher et al. suggest exploring both instrumental impacts (direct use of research in policy or practice) and conceptual impacts (complex and often indirect ways in which research can have an impact on the knowledge, understanding, and attitudes of policymakers and practitioners) [38,39]. Inclusion of conceptual impacts, such as attitude change, enlightenment, or development of new networks or capacities, helps to broaden the frame of reference when it comes to viewing uses of knowledge and appreciating the range of ways society interacts with knowledge [40]. In addition to being examples of impact on their own [41], conceptual impacts can also act as indicators for the potential instrumental uses that may emerge over longer timeframes and could be traced through long-term evaluation work. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
36 Advancing the science of actionable knowledge for sustainability
Evaluation of actionable-knowledge processes should be built on the same principles of actionable knowledge itself; that is, both must be grounded in equitable and fair participation, with attention to the process linchpin of how, when, and why participants engage and collaborate. There are myriad paths to success as well as contextdependent definitions of success.
Conclusions From a problem-driven perspective, engaged research aims to contribute in addressing societal challenges through the creation of actionable knowledge. Co-production of actionable knowledge, however, has persisted as a diverse and idealized concept. In this context, the jargon of co-production may have crowded out other forms of interactive science practices with important lessons for supporting environmental sustainability. Additionally, idealized conceptualizations of co-production may obfuscate its governance dimensions and make evaluation of outcomes challenging. Here, we have introduced actionable knowledge, the role of co-production as a tool for governance, and the forms of engaged research that can advance actionable knowledge. Recognition of this diversity is necessary in evaluating, funding, and advancing the processes and impacts of actionable knowledge for societal sustainability.
Conflict of interest statement Nothing declared.
Acknowledgements
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This article was developed through, and greatly improved by, discussions within the Science of Actionable Knowledge (SOAK) group. In the development of this special issue, SOAK was convened through support from the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC) under funding received from the National Science Foundation (DBI-1639145). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation. We thank Erica Johnston for assistance with figure preparation and reference management.
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39. Spaapen J, van Drooge L: Introducing ‘productive interactions’ in social impact assessment. Res Eval 2011, 20:211-218. 40. Doyle J: Reconceptualising research impact: reflections on the real-world impact of research in an Australian context. Higher Educ Res Dev 2018, 37:1366-1379. 41. Amara N, Ouimet M, Landry R: New evidence on instrumental, conceptual, and symbolic utilization of university research in government agencies. Sci Commun 2004, 26:75-106. 42. Stokes DE: Pasteur’s Quadrant: Basic Science and Technological Innovation. Brookings Institution Press; 2011. 43. Arnott JC, Neuenfeldt RJ, Lemos MC: Co-producing science for sustainability: can funding change knowledge use? Global Environ Change 2020, 60:1-12. 44. Matso KE, Becker ML: What can funders do to better link science with decisions? Case studies of coastal communities and climate change. Environ Manage 2014, 54:1356-1371. 45. Moser SC: Can science on transformation transform science? Lessons from co-design. Curr Opin Environ Sustain 2016, 20:106-115. 46. DeLorme DE, Kidwell D, Hagen SC, Stephens SH: Developing and managing transdisciplinary and transformative research on the coastal dynamics of sea level rise: experiences and lessons learned. Earths Future 2016, 4:194-209. 47. Trueblood D, Almaza´n-Casali S, Arnott J, Brass M, Lemos MC, Matso K et al.: Advancing knowledge for use in coastal and estuarine management: competitive research in the National Estuarine Research Reserve system. Coastal Manage 2019, 0:1-10 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08920753.2019.1598221. 48. Bednarek AT, Shouse B, Hudson CG, Goldburg R: Science-policy intermediaries from a practitioner’s perspective: the Lenfest Ocean Program experience. Sci Public Policy 2016, 43:291-300.
Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
ScienceDirect Actionable knowledge and the art of engagement Katharine J Mach1,2, Maria Carmen Lemos3, Alison M Meadow4, Carina Wyborn5, Nicole Klenk6, James C Arnott3,7, Nicole M Ardoin8,9, Clare Fieseler10,11, Richard H Moss12,13, Leah Nichols14, Missy Stults15, Catherine Vaughan16 and Gabrielle Wong-Parodi9,17 What makes knowledge relevant to environmental sustainability actionable, and how can its societal impacts be evaluated? Scholars and practitioners have increasingly advocated that the traditional linear model of knowledge production, with its unidirectional flow of information from researchers to policymakers, be replaced by a new approach in which researchers and knowledge-users meaningfully interact to co-create knowledge that is actionable in decision-making. This popular model — coproduction — has advanced thinking on how to create usable knowledge. In practice, however, co-production has not been a single approach, but instead a diversity of forms of engaged research. Further, the jargon may both obfuscate governance dimensions and limit understanding of what works. Improved distinction among the different ways researchers and societal partners interact can enable attentive and effective engagement across contexts. Recognition of this diversity is necessary in advancing the processes and impacts of actionable knowledge for sustainability. Addresses 1 Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, University of Miami, Miami, FL, USA 2
Leonard and Jayne Abess Center for Ecosystem Science and Policy, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, USA 3 School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA 4 Institute of the Environment, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA 5 Luc Hoffmann Institute, Gland, Switzerland 6 Department of Physical and Environmental Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada 7 Aspen Global Change Institute, Basalt, CO, USA 8 Graduate School of Education, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA 9 Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA 10 Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA 11 National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC, USA 12 Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA 13 Joint Global Change Research Institute, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, College Park, MD, USA 14 Independent Scholar, USA 15 Office of Sustainability and Innovations, City of Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor, MI, USA 16 International Research Institute for Climate and Society, Earth Institute/Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory, New York, NY, USA 17 Department of Earth System Science, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA Corresponding author: Mach, Katharine J ([email protected]) Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37 This review comes from a themed issue on Advancing the science of actionable knowledge for sustainability Edited by James C Arnott, Katharine J Mach and Gabrielle WongParodi
Received: 07 June 2019; Accepted: 13 January 2020
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2020.01.002 1877-3435/ã 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Introduction As societies around the world grapple with increasing challenges to environmental sustainability, questions about what makes knowledge actionable, how we design and fund programs to incentivize it, and how we evaluate the outcomes of its use and societal impact are more relevant than ever. In the past few decades, scientists, practitioners, and research funders have made great strides towards a model of knowledge co-production that has been empirically shown to increase the use of knowledge in decision-making, that is, making research outputs actionable (see Jagannathan et al. and Arnott et al., this issue). However, a substantial portion of the environmental literature focusing on how to overcome barriers to knowledge use has conceptualized knowledge production and use as a dichotomy between two dominant models: one science/knowledge-driven (the loading dock) and one interaction/problem-driven (co-production). While this dichotomy may have increased attention to the importance of researcher–decision-maker interactions in creating actionable knowledge, it has also reified coproduction as the dominant path to usability [1]. Co-production is often defined as substantive interactions between producers and users of knowledge that results in knowledge that fits decisions contexts [2,3,4]. Yet how co-production happens in practice is less clear. While normatively the process of co-production is expected to create and rely on trusted iterative relationships, www.sciencedirect.com
Actionable knowledge and engagement
empirically documented descriptions of such processes are rare (see Jagannathan et al., this issue). Rather, what we find are descriptions of stakeholder workshops, the solicitation of information needs through surveys or focus groups, and the more recent practice of including potential users in research teams. But why should this matter? We contend that there are at least three crucial implications of co-production persisting as an idealized, yet also diversely and imprecisely defined concept that inevitably falls short of meeting its own standards. First, the jargon of co-production crowds out other forms of interactive science practices whose long tradition of methods, practices, and empirical research could support not only the practice of co-production itself but also different approaches to engagement of scientists and practitioners. Second, conceptualizations of co-production as intrinsically collaborative may obfuscate the role of co-production as a governance mechanism that defines who participates and who does not, what voices matter, and how decision-making may be changed as a result. Third, coproduction ideals often make evaluation and comparative analyses of what works a challenge, at times limiting our ability to better design and fund problem-driven research. From a problem-driven perspective, the goal of engaged research is to address societal challenges; creation of actionable knowledge is the means to that end. However, the pathways for impact are not always clear and there is a need to better understand the landscape of actionable knowledge production, including how other forms of engaged/ interactive science can contribute and when and how coproduction itself works and to what end. And it is also important to question when the process of co-production itself may work against the very goals that inspire the principles of engaged science, such as inclusion and diversity of ideas and justice of outcomes. To advance these interrelated themes, we explore the complexity of actionable knowledge and of co-production processes, tackling sometimes contradictory definitions and applications and building common understanding of the issues shaping the pathways between co-production and impact. First, we introduce actionable knowledge. Second, we discuss the role of co-production as a tool for governance as well as production of actionable knowledge. Third, we reflect on the diversity of existing engaged research, which can provide lessons for effective collaborations between researchers and societal partners. Pulling these threads together, we conclude with a framework for evaluating processes of actionable knowledge that attends to their context specificity and the need for equitable, meaningful interactions that produce knowledge that fits decision contexts.
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[relevance of research] in the world.” That is, such knowledge is “not only relevant to the world of practice, [but] it is the knowledge that people use to create the world” [5]. This definition builds upon earlier concepts such as Aristotelian practical knowledge and the idea of praxis, which in the social and political sciences refers to the process of reflection and action directed at the transformation of social structures [6,7]. Antonacopoulou explains that actionable knowledge illustrates the impact that scholarship can have by connecting theory and practice, knowledge and action [8]. Actionable knowledge is thereby distinct from standard scholarship by explicitly linking theory and practice. More recent re-conceptualizations of actionable knowledge have occurred in the context of sustainability and climate change adaptation science. Here, the term actionable science has been introduced and defined as involving “data, analyses, and forecasts that are sufficiently predictive, accepted, and understandable to support decision making, including capital investment decisions” [emphasis added] [9]. The embedded assumption in this definition is that the science should match management needs — but that the action will take place in a realm separate from the generation of knowledge. In this definition, science should be framed to be supportive of decision-making, but not explicitly include action. For example, Palmer argues for a focus on the “potential to inform decisions,” and moving closer to action through “improv[ing] the design or implementation of public policies” or “influenc[ing] . . . strategies and behaviors that affect the environment” [10]. Similarly, Beier et al. focus on the form of the information (e.g. data, analyses, projections) that supports decisions and guidance on the appropriate use of the information [11]. In the historic use of the term actionable knowledge, the assumption was that action was embedded within the knowledge, such as creating knowledge specifically about which management action to take and how to implement it. In more recent conceptualizations of actionable science, the action appears to occur outside of the knowledge-production process and within the realm of practice, where the science is tailored to inform an action, while not directly providing advice or details about which action to take and how. Here, there can also be a fear or possibility that decision-making and needs for action can bias or corrupt the science. These different conceptualizations of actionability may be valid and likely depend on the nature of the decision-making body. Understanding both definitions, and having the capacity to openly discuss the implications of each within a coproduction or other engagement process, can help to ensure that usable forms of knowledge and action emerge.
Actionable knowledge in principle and in practice
What is in a name: when is co-production co-production, and why should we care?
Argyris defines the term actionable knowledge as “that knowledge required to implement the external validity
In both scholarly articles and practical manuals of how to co-produce, there remain some ambiguity and variance in
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32 Advancing the science of actionable knowledge for sustainability
the ways co-production is conceptualized, but more importantly, in the ways it is put into practice. There are three root causes. First, the diverse intellectual lineage of the term ‘co-production’ includes different, but related definitions [12]. In particular, sustainability science focuses attention on co-production as a collaborative process whereby knowledge is produced in the service of generating action. By contrast, public administration and science, technology, and society (STS) studies see coproduction as the social processes and practices where action is taken. Second, there is the imprecision of concepts such as ‘meaningful interaction’ and ‘repeated iteration.’ For example, is it co-production if producers and users meet just once? Or what if intensive interaction occurs, but there is little evidence of either group changing the way it produces and uses knowledge? Third, as discussed in the next section, the difference between coproduction and other forms of engaged research remains somewhat lax.
From such experiences, there is a growing recognition that bringing producers and users of science into a collaborative process is, in itself, insufficient to ensure that the knowledge produced is actually used to inform decision-making — or that it will be inclusive or legitimate. This is particularly the case when drivers of unsustainable behaviors or the levers for change emanate across multiple scales [16]. A more explicit focus on actions and decisions taken as part of an intervention requires practitioners of co-production to ask questions about how participants are selected, whether they have the legitimacy to represent a broader group of stakeholders, whose knowledge counts, and how different knowledge claims and perceptions of evidence are reconciled. This approach requires academic practitioners of co-production to accept that more than just knowledge is being produced through these processes, and that efforts to create actionable knowledge must engage with political, value-laden, and sometimes uncomfortable questions.
Scholars of co-production in STS studies would argue that these questions do not matter since co-production cannot be parceled and counted as a process with discrete analytical steps. Co-production just is — in that knowledge simultaneously is a product and is constitutive of society. In contrast, scholarship in the more normative tradition of defining, implementing, and evaluating co-production has often argued for best practices and recommendations on how to set up co-production that works. Moving beyond these framings to focus attention on the actionability of knowledge underscores the ways knowledge production practices, collaborative or otherwise, are situated within broader socio-political contexts, and the processes through which decisions about sustainability are made. In this view, the practice of co-production is a means of changing how decisions are made by changing who is present in the knowledge-production processes.
A range of concepts and frameworks have been put forward to illustrate participation in knowledge production as a process and practice situated within broader socio-political contexts and networks. Such approaches include, for example, considering the rules and norms that formalize how knowledge is tested and deemed trustworthy [15,17], or the ways that rules and norms inform how actors engage with, and construct, spaces of participation [18]. These frameworks also attend to the role of worldviews, values, and visions in shaping participatory research practices and science–policy engagements [13,17,18,19]. And because there are different motivations underpinning participatory research practices, such as, for example, changing the types of structures that shape how decisions about the environment are made, it is important to attend to both the agency of the individuals within these participatory spaces and that which is created through mobilizing diverse perspectives and engagement practices towards a common goal. Mapping socio-political contexts in which actionable-knowledge interventions are situated can enable researchers and practitioners alike to understand how an intervention and its output are likely to generate knowledge and produce actions that are aligned with (or not) their broader context.
Focusing attention on decision-making processes brings to light the broader socio-political and institutional contexts shaping the production and use of actionable knowledge. Incentive structures and governance arrangements can hinder efforts to generate knowledge useful to and used in decision-making [13]. Beyond the usual barriers of time, funding, and capacities to engage across research and practice, there are often more pervasive institutional barriers that undermine efforts to produce actionable knowledge. For example, siloed organizations, institutional cultures, and mindsets of policy and practice can make knowledge integration difficult even when direct efforts are made to support such integration [14]. As such, efforts to engage in the production of actionable knowledge that do not understand, nor intentionally address, these barriers are likely to have limited impact. Consequently, co-production interventions should strive to balance fit with existing institutional processes in striving to change these arrangements [15]. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
Lessons from the diversity of engaged research Decades of work in developing collaborative and participatory methods provide guideposts for engaged methods in new sustainability contexts, with responsiveness to desired sustainability contributions, different knowledge forms, including stakeholders and their interests, and existing collaborations (Figure 1) [11,20,21]. For example, social science traditions of action research and participatory action research pioneered understanding of the relationship among inclusion, engagement, and social www.sciencedirect.com
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Figure 1
Diverse forms of engaged research Researchers
Contractual Provision of research & services & consulting resources
Specific stages
Origin of research question
Stakeholders
Type of relationship
Partnerships
Interaction over time
Collaborative research (e.g., action research to coproduction)
Continuous
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Diverse forms of engaged research. Approaches to engaged research differ in the origins of research questions, the types of relationships between researchers and societal partners, and the nature of interactions over time. These modes of engagement have occurred in varying contexts through time, with complementary and overlapping terms used to describe the processes.
change. Indigenous knowledge production and research processes provide key insights for well-informed and respectful cross-cultural interactions (see Box 1). Community-based participatory research in public health and medical sciences has involved practical engagement of communities for broadly impactful social change (e.g. vaccination or nutrition practices extending beyond the community in question), while translational medicine has focused on the actionability and implementation of completed research in complex decision-making contexts. Research focused on practical action has spanned use-inspired basic research, transdisciplinary research, and knowledge exchange, and the management and organizational sciences have additionally yielded lessons about organizational structures and functions, including the context of use. Assessment processes are yet another example [22], in which organized and interactive processes focus on evaluating and communicating the state of knowledge on issues relevant to and legitimate for decision-making. Finally, science-to-action initiatives or research–practice partnerships increasingly involve diverse participation (e.g. citizen science), partnerships, boundary organizations, funders, and management agencies. Across this history and in the present, modes of engagement between researchers and stakeholders reflect different degrees of stakeholder interaction across research phases, also incorporating different forms of knowledge (Figure 1) [21]. Goals include producing more usable information through interactions, extending science through the knowledge and values of nonscientists, enabling public services, building capacity within www.sciencedirect.com
governance institutions, supporting social learning, or empowering traditional knowledge systems [2]. Societally engaged research can include the contractual or the consultative domain, where researchers interact with stakeholders to test technologies or diagnose problems [11,20]; however, it also can be much more collaborative and collegial, with knowledge co-generated in partnership and interactions continuous and ongoing. The more collaborative forms of engagement aim towards co-creation of knowledge with the people who are most likely to use the knowledge in making changes in their organizations, communities, or environments. Knowledge making and decision-making can thereby continually reshape one another [2,13]. The focus in empirically documented experiences has largely been on processes of collaborative engagement, as compared to outcomes in advancing knowledge that is used. This focus can be partly explained by the temporal disconnect between engagement and actions taken and impacts realized. It also stems from engagement processes themselves being an important form of intervention, changing interactions between researchers and societies (see Section ‘What is in a name: when is co-production co-production, and why should we care?’). Within this focus, collaborative research has been distinguished in its emphasis on building relationships, acknowledging and sharing power, encouraging participation, making change in both societal and research practices, and establishing credible accounts [23]. It is driven by decisions, time managed, and rooted in processes that are inclusive, collaborative, and flexible [11,24]. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
34 Advancing the science of actionable knowledge for sustainability
Box 1 Actionable knowledge for whom and for what? The production of actionable knowledge with Indigenous communities is more than a research practice. It is a political and ethical undertaking. Co-production processes involving Indigenous peoples ought to stand out from general technical and effectiveness assessments of co-production processes because of the nature of Indigenous knowledges. As an embodied practice embedded within a worldview, Indigenous knowledge is inseparable from the sociocultural, political, legal, and other grounded, largely place-based relations and obligations that give rise to holistic knowledge systems (Latulippe and Klenk, this issue). Engaging with Indigenous peoples in co-production processes requires something different than intercultural respect, which equates Indigenous knowledge with cultural beliefs and practices. Knowledge co-production processes that mobilize Indigenous knowledges must focus on the governance value of such knowledge to Indigenous communities over and above its supplementary value to science and the global community [25]. The production process must also consider the historical legacy and ongoing challenges of colonialism in environmental science and governance, seeking to remove structural barriers to Indigenous resurgence (jurisdictional, policies, and practices); it must respect Indigenous knowledge sovereignty by strengthening the use and transmission of Indigenous knowledge by and for Indigenous peoples; it must seek out the diversity of the Indigenous knowledges that are differently composed and unevenly distributed; and foremost, it must support enabling structures for Indigenous communities’ collective capacity for self-determination [26–31]. Co-production processes involving Indigenous communities not only require making room for different ways of knowing (which is applicable to any research involving local and traditional knowledges), they also require strengthening and removing barriers to Indigenous selfdetermination and access to land, which is essential to the nourishment and flourishing of Indigenous knowledge systems (Latulippe and Klenk, this issue). If we are to decolonize the co-production of environmental knowledge production and governance capacity, fundamental changes are required in dominant research and decision-making institutions. These need to ‘move over’ to respect the rights of Indigenous communities to make plans for the future using Indigenous planning and decision-making processes that are wellinformed, culturally relevant, and respectful of human interdependence with non-humans and the environment [32].
Towards such processes, collaborative research requires specific skills and intention supported by training, efforts to ensure the research is what is needed, acknowledgment and incorporation of the responsibilities and knowledge of partners, and a committed attitude enabling collaboration. At the start, scientists ensure the interests of their partners, listen, and discuss expectations and goals, such that the partners receive identifiable benefits [3,13]. Problems and questions are defined together; data are jointly collected and analyzed and outputs cocreated, with safe spaces for error and failure critical in enabling learning. Further, collaborative research involves both scientists and stakeholders in understanding what an organization or community might want to do with the information in making change and how such support and collaboration can be continued into the future, enabling social learning beyond the end of the project. In this way, collaborative research can produce knowledge to address complex problems and also produce governance systems, recognizing different Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
knowledges and incorporating collaboration and trusted relationships [24]. These co-production interactions are often occurring within profoundly complex, adaptive, and also political science–policy and broader social– environmental systems [11,13].
Evaluating actionable-knowledge processes and impacts Different from evaluating basic research projects where outcomes and goals are clear and measurable, evaluation of projects, programs, and organizations that aim to produce actionable knowledge requires consideration of processes and principles that embrace participation, equity, and knowledge usability. These processes have implications both for the project and for program-level funding (see Box 2). Hence the goals for evaluating actionable-knowledge processes include the perspectives and voices of all participants; seek to determine whether and how actionable knowledge was produced; and identify any socio-ecological impacts that emerged because of the actionable-knowledge process. However, there are several challenges inherent to actionable knowledge and the use of knowledge in decisionmaking that we must consider when designing evaluation processes. Actionable knowledge’s context-specific nature means that it may look different depending on the places, times, and groups involved — there are no set metrics that can be applied to all actionable-knowledge processes (for example, see Box 1). Second, tracing socio-ecological impacts from research or engagement processes is on the Box 2 Funding actionable knowledge Scaling up the production of actionable knowledge requires innovation in approaches to the financial support of research. Research funding has always been linked to prevailing assumptions about how science benefits society. For example, public funding structures have historically been organized around the linear model that separates basic and applied research funding streams and, in the process, institutionalizes a form of distance between science and society [42]. Moving forward, funders are well-situated to test out and learn from alternative approaches (see Arnott et al., this issue). For example, funders can incorporate requirements for co-production into solicitations, thus stimulating researchers to adopt practices more likely to produce actionable knowledge [43–45]. Funders may engage users at multiple stages of the funding life cycle to help prioritize research questions, review proposals, and assess outcomes [46,47]. Funders may also apply their own institutional knowledge and capacity to provide forms of non-financial assistance by serving as a type of boundary organization themselves and offering other forms of training and technical assistance to projects [48]. Understanding how these types of approaches influence the production of actionable knowledge will require funders to both reimagine how they evaluate the impact of their portfolios as well as carefully attend to the issues of participation, process, and equity raised in this article. The resulting experiences from alternative approaches to funding can also provide an important opportunity for more empirical scholarship on actionable knowledge.
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Figure 2
Evaluating actionable-knowledge production Principles of producing actionable knowledge:
1. Substantive interactions
2. Equitable relationships
3. Usable knowledge
Principles-focused evaluation: 1. 2. 3.
Are these principles meaningful to participants? Did participants adhere to the principles throughout the process? Did the process lead towards the desired result? Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability
Principles-focused evaluation of actionable-knowledge production.
frontier of evaluation work. There is significant uncertainty about how and when knowledge moves from actionability, to action, to tangible impacts as the process may take years [33], often outside the timescale of evaluation. There is also uncertainty about how to determine the extent to which any impact can be attributed to any one process or piece of knowledge [34]. A promising approach to evaluating context-dependent and innovative processes, such as the production of actionable knowledge, is principles-focused evaluation (Figure 2) [35]. Principles-focused evaluation is designed to be used for projects, programs, and organizations that are innovative and for which no fixed metrics of success exist. The approach relies on the identification of core principles, which will guide participants through uncharted territory. Above we outlined the principles of producing actionable knowledge as 1) engaging in substantive interactions between producers and users of knowledge, 2) ensuring equitable relationships among parties engaged in the process, and 3) producing knowledge that is usable by decision-makers. The principles-focused evaluation approach then centers on answering three questions (Figure 2). First, are these principles meaningful to the participants? Answering this question necessitates a participatory approach as meaningfulness must be defined by all parties. It also requires that evaluation be built into the project, so that agreement on the principles can be assessed early in the process and adjustments made, if necessary. Second, did the participants adhere to the principles throughout the process? This question requires a process-evaluation approach so that the evaluator can determine whether the principles were in play throughout the www.sciencedirect.com
engagement process. Process evaluation includes examinations of how, when, and in what ways researchers and practitioners collaborated during the process; who was involved in or excluded from the process; whether power, roles, and responsibilities were shared equitably; and whether there were barriers to collaboration that affected some people’s level of engagement [4,36]. Process evaluation also provides opportunities for participants to reflect, learn, and course-correct, as necessary, during the process rather than waiting until the end to identify barriers or challenges. Third, did the process lead to desired results? Evaluation of the outputs and outcomes of an actionable-knowledge process should include participants’ perspectives on usability, including the possibility of multiple pathways to usability [37], as well as identifying and tracing both tangible and intangible uses of the knowledge or other outputs. It is important to consider a range of uses and impacts; tangible impacts may not be the most obvious or easiest to trace, due to the time-lag and attribution challenges outlined above. Meagher et al. suggest exploring both instrumental impacts (direct use of research in policy or practice) and conceptual impacts (complex and often indirect ways in which research can have an impact on the knowledge, understanding, and attitudes of policymakers and practitioners) [38,39]. Inclusion of conceptual impacts, such as attitude change, enlightenment, or development of new networks or capacities, helps to broaden the frame of reference when it comes to viewing uses of knowledge and appreciating the range of ways society interacts with knowledge [40]. In addition to being examples of impact on their own [41], conceptual impacts can also act as indicators for the potential instrumental uses that may emerge over longer timeframes and could be traced through long-term evaluation work. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 2020, 42:30–37
36 Advancing the science of actionable knowledge for sustainability
Evaluation of actionable-knowledge processes should be built on the same principles of actionable knowledge itself; that is, both must be grounded in equitable and fair participation, with attention to the process linchpin of how, when, and why participants engage and collaborate. There are myriad paths to success as well as contextdependent definitions of success.
Conclusions From a problem-driven perspective, engaged research aims to contribute in addressing societal challenges through the creation of actionable knowledge. Co-production of actionable knowledge, however, has persisted as a diverse and idealized concept. In this context, the jargon of co-production may have crowded out other forms of interactive science practices with important lessons for supporting environmental sustainability. Additionally, idealized conceptualizations of co-production may obfuscate its governance dimensions and make evaluation of outcomes challenging. Here, we have introduced actionable knowledge, the role of co-production as a tool for governance, and the forms of engaged research that can advance actionable knowledge. Recognition of this diversity is necessary in evaluating, funding, and advancing the processes and impacts of actionable knowledge for societal sustainability.
Conflict of interest statement Nothing declared.
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This article was developed through, and greatly improved by, discussions within the Science of Actionable Knowledge (SOAK) group. In the development of this special issue, SOAK was convened through support from the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC) under funding received from the National Science Foundation (DBI-1639145). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation. We thank Erica Johnston for assistance with figure preparation and reference management.
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17. Munoz-Erickson TA, Miller CA, Miller TR: How cities think: knowledge co-production for urban sustainability and resilience. Forests 2017, 8:1-17.
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24. Vincent K, Daly M, Scannell C, Leathes B: What can climate services learn from theory and practice of co-production? Climate Serv 2018, 12:48-58 In this review, the authors distill principles for a normative and pragmatic approach to co-produced climate services. They assert that a co-produced product should be decision-driven, process-based, and timemanaged. And the associated process should be inclusive, collaborative, and flexible.
legitimacy for understanding the link between process and impact. Res Eval 2018, 27:132-144 Attribution is a core challenge in evaluating transdisciplinary research. That is, is societal change able to be linked to the research process? Going beyond relevance, credibility, and legitimacy in simple terms, the analysis unfolds the diverse ways that process qualities, internally and externally, are crucial in understanding the value and effectiveness of transdisciplinary research.
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