Market response of real estate and automotive industry during pandemic-a transdisciplinary approach

Implications of transdisciplinarity for sustainability research

Abstract: In ecological economics the terms sustainable development and transdisciplinarity are closely related. It is shown that this close relation is due to the fact that research for sustainable development has to be issue oriented and reflect the diversity, complexity and dynamics of the processes involved as well as their variability between specific problem situations. Furthermore, the knowledge of people involved and their needs and interests at stake have to be taken into account. There are three basic and interrelated questions about issues to be addressed in sustainability research: (1) In which way do processes constitute a problem field and where are the needs for change? (2) What are more sustainable practices? (3) How can existing practices be transformed? To treat them properly, transdisciplinary research is needed. The emergence of transdisciplinary research in the North and the South is described. By distinguishing analytically among basic, applied and transdisciplinary research the challenges that have to be tackled in transdisciplinary projects are analyzed.

Achieving the promise of transdisciplinarity: a critical exploration of the relationship between transdisciplinary research and societal problem solving

Abstract: Transdisciplinarity is often presented as a way to effectively use scientific research to contribute to societal problem solving for sustainability The aim of this paper is to critically explore this statement This is done in two ways First, a literature survey of transdisciplinary research is used to identify the assumptions that underlie the positive relationship between transdisciplinarity and societal problem solving for sustainability This mapping identifies the claim that in-depth participation of users and the integration of relevant knowledge from both practice and research in real-world problem contexts produce socially robust results that contribute to sustainability Second, the ability to live up to this claim is presented and discussed in five case study projects from Mistra Urban Futures, a transdisciplinary center in Goteborg, Sweden The conclusions show that transdisciplinary processes, which fulfill the above conditions, do produce different types of socially robust knowledge, but this does not necessarily result in the ability to influence change in a sustainable direction This instead creates a paradox in that the participation of stakeholders and the integration of knowledge from diverse sources require spaces that are both embedded in and insulated from practice and science proper Such spaces produce results that are not easily aligned with sector-based target groups and formal policy processes Institutionalizing transdisciplinarity in a boundary organization therefore solves some problems regarding participation and balanced problem ownership However, it also creates new, hybrid problems, regarding knowledge transfer and scalability, which bridge the boundaries and challenge the praxis of planning and policy making

Transdisciplinarity in the Practice of Research

Abstract: Introduction The term ‘transdisciplinarity’ was first used in a way similar to today’s meaning by Erich Jantsch (1972), a physicist and early complexity researcher, at an OECD conference in 1970 in Nice. For Jantsch the term referred to the targeted coordination of a group of disciplines and inter-disciplines, which together are involved in a complex scientific system, and which have a common purpose, with this coordination based on a general system of axioms that are considered binding on all concerned. Which system of axioms should serve as the basis for such a coordinated effort was not explained by Jantsch. Despite this conceptual lack of clarity the term was successful, leading to discussions and debates within the philosophy and sociology of science concerning possible different forms of discipline-spanning scientific practice. A milestone in the German debate was reached at a symposium in the Center for Interdisciplinary Research, Bielefeld (Kocka 1987). There the attempt was made to link inter-and transdisciplinarity to ‘disciplinarity’ in order to reduce conceptual ambiguity. To this end the psychologist Heinz Heckhausen proposed drawing a distinction between ‘academic subjects’ and ‘disciplines.’ By ‘academic subject’ he understood an organizational unit combining teaching and research (e.g., a ‘professorship’), while ‘disciplinarity’ refers to a “theoretical level of integration” (Heckhausen 1987). The philosopher Juergen Mittelstraß then moved the discussion further by also linking transdisciplinarity to disciplinarity, while at the same time relating it to “problems that technological cultures, i.e., modern industrial societies, have in great numbers (Mittelstraß 1987: 154). Some years later he went on to define ‘transdisciplinarity’ as a form of research practice that “has freed itself from disciplinary boundaries, defining and solving its problems independently of any discipline (Mittelstraß 1998: 44).

The Initial Yield Revealed: Explicit Valuations and the Future of Property Investment

Abstract: Starts from the basic principles of property investment and shows that the initial yield conceals estimates of a risk premium, expected income growth and expected depreciation. Suggests that an explicit valuation procedure which can be used at any level ranging from a single property to the aggregate market may be constructed. Concludes that the surveying profession is under threat from those able to meet the growing demand for such explicit analyses.