Tackling Wicked Problems: Through the Transdisciplinary Imagination

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Product Description From climate change to GM foods, we are increasingly confronted with complex, interconnected social and environmental problems that span disciplines, knowledge bases and value systems. This book offers a transdisciplinary, open approach for those working towards resolving these 'wicked' problems and highlights the crucial role of this 'transdisciplinary imagination' in addressing the shift to sustainable futures. Tackling Wicked Problems provides readers with a framework and practical examples that will guide the design and conduct of their own open-ended enquiries. In this approach, academic disciplines are combined with personal, local and strategic understanding and researchers are required to recognise multiple knowledge cultures, accept the inevitability of uncertainty, and clarify their own and others' ethical positions. The authors then comment on fifteen practical examples of how researchers have engaged with the opportunities and challenges of conducting transdisciplinary inquiries. The book gives those who are grappling with complex problems innovative methods of inquiry that will allow them to work collaboratively towards long-term solutions. Review 'Tackling Wicked Problems is a timely volume that deserves a wide, global readership.' Nature 'I am really delighted to see a work that provides a philosophical foundation for Post-Normal Science, while enriching and expanding its vision. Valerie Brown and her colleagues - really comrades - have achieved the new synthesis for a scientific practice that is so necessary for the current age. At last there is a statement for science that leaves behind the linear logic and truncated self-awareness that was the heritage of Descartes. With its themes of plurality, paradox, complementarity and ethical commitment, Tackling Wicked Problems provides the means for science to make a creative response to the challenges of our time.' Jerome Ravetz, James Martin Institute for Science and Civilization, University of Oxford, UK 'Tackling Wicked Problems is a timely, inspirational and important book. Complex and 'wicked problems', are common and growing - within societies, regions, locally and globally. They are found in relation to many issues including environmental, human health, urban planning and transport. Importantly, the cross-connections between issues are typically part of the complexity. So far our decision-making processes have not served us well in addressing these issues. Yet the need for more effective decision-making processes is urgent, with anthropogenic climate change perhaps the prime example of a wicked problem in need of urgent action. This book provides an excellent analysis of the inadequacies of our current approaches and the benefits of frameworks based on open transdisciplinary inquiry for addressing 'wicked problems'. It complements this theoretical basis with a strong set of practical examples of open transdisciplinary inquiry by 15 authors from across the natural and social sciences, the humanities, environmental and public sector management, political science and community activism. Tackling Wicked Problems should have an important place in both under and post-graduate courses across a range of University faculties. But it deserves (and we need) it to be far more widely read - by decision-makers in both the public and private sectors and all of us interested in more effective action on the many current and emerging 'wicked problems' that threaten to undermine humanity's future.' Ronnie Harding, Foundation Director, Institute of Environmental Studies, University of NSW, Australia 'One of the critical questions posed by the ecological crisis concerns the nature of the knowledge we need to deal with it. Tackling Wicked Problems tackles the problem by offering a unique transdisciplinary approach to inquiry, one that is capable of integrating the natural and social sciences. Integrating both empirical and normative investigation, it offer