Transdisciplinary Approaches to Understand and Facilitate Transformations Towards Sustainability

Many political decision-making processes are based on evidence and expert knowledge. However, expert knowledge and its use in public policy arenas have become increasingly contested in society. This is particularly true for complex issues related to sustainable development, such as climate change or loss of biodiversity. Even during the COVID-19 crisis, scientific advice beyond protecting against infections has been highly scrutinized by many actors in society. The classic science-policy interface of “truth speaks to power” is not adequate anymore to address these new challenges. Concepts such as transformative, transdisciplinary, or co-creative research elucidate the direction in which scientific research finds its new role(s). The paper provides a short overview of these new approaches to re-defining the nexus between science and policymaking. The main message is to combine classic curiosity-driven approaches of scientific inquiry with goal-oriented and catalytic concepts. This combination meets the requirement of a new scientific approach that can be labeled as transformative and transdisciplinary.