Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development

Home | Overview | People | Events | Documents | Links | Private | Search | Contact Us

Events

Return to Events listing without descriptions

Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development: Mobilizing R&D for Decisionmaking. 18 February 2007. AAAS Annual Meeting Symposium, San Francisco, CA.

What makes some knowledge systems more effective than others in harnessing science and technology with the goals of sustainable development? “Knowledge systems” are viewed as consisting of a network of linked actors, organizations, and objects that perform a number of knowledge-related functions that link knowledge and know-how with action. Included are the incentives, financial resources, institutions, and human capital that give such systems capacity to do their work, and the intention to focus such work in some arenas rather than others. We evaluate how generalizable findings about knowledge systems might be. We begin with the premise that usable knowledge is ultimately "contextualized," i.e., adapted to specific circumstances of place. The question remains, what (if any) generalizations about "what works" in the design of effective knowledge systems can be carried over from place to place, or sector to sector, or problem to problem. The symposium will present findings from a multi-year international comparative research project, with synthesis papers on three challenges facing systems seeking to promote the mobilization and application of useful knowledge: linking knowledge with action; multiple knowledge systems in development; and governing knowledge systems. Responses to the challenges will be illustrated by drawing on case studies from around the world examining knowledge systems for water management, climate forecasts, fisheries, agriculture, and health. [Symposium Speaker Abstracts and Slides]

Bridging the Gap: Translating Livestock Research Knowledge into Action for Sustainable Development. 15-17 November 2006. Co-organized by Harvard University and the International Livestock Research Institute, Nairobi, Kenya.

The goals of the workshop Bridging the Gap: Translating Livestock Research Knowledge into Action for Sustainable Development were to discuss what makes some teams/projects at the International Livestock Research Center work better than others in linking knowledge with action and to explore some characteristics of successful teams/projects. Projects evaluated included: Fodder innovations for small holders in India; Reto-o-Reto project: Better policy and management options for pastoral lands; Poverty mapping; Preventing and containing trypanocide resistance in the cotton zone of West Africa; and Improving Productivity and Market Success of Ethiopian Farmers.

Enhancing the Effectiveness of Sustainability Partnerships. 30-31 August 2006. US National Academies, Jonsson Center,Woods Hole, MA.

The workshop Enhancing the Effectiveness of Sustainability Partnerships explored the emerging role of public-private partnerships in addressing the challenges to harnessing science and technology for sustainable development. Promoting the concept of partnerships among governments, business and civil society as a strategy to move the world toward sustainability was one of the main outcomes of the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD). Public-private partnerships for sustainable development, such as the Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate and the SEED (Supporting Entrepreneurs for Environment and Development) also have been embraced by the U.S. government as part of commitments made at WSSD. The workshop explored selected cases of public-private partnerships for sustainable development, as well as the unparalleled wealth of Roundtable members’ experience with other relevant partnership efforts. The workshop began a process of identifying: i) examples of particularly successful or instructive partnerships from which useful lessons might be extracted; ii) most significant obstacles to successful partnerships and effective means of overcoming them; and iii) sustainability challenges for which public-private partnerships are most (and least) likely to prove helpful. The workshop found that the experience of public-private partnerships could usefully receive further and more systematic exploration as a means of linking knowledge with action for sustainability. Possible follow up activities were also discussed. Selected cases for discussion by the workshop were organized around three key sustainability themes: public health, green chemistry, and agriculture. The steering group responsible for organizing the summer study workshop selected examples that focused on applying scientific knowledge and technology for sustainability; involved partnerships among three or more sectors; and were recognized as particularly effective at moving toward sustainability.

[http://www7.nationalacademies.org/sustainabilityroundtable/Public_Private_Workshop_Main.html]

Linking Knowledge with Action in the Pursuit of Sustainable Water Resource Management. 19-22 February 2006. Office of Sustainability Initiatives, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA.

The Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development (KSSD) Project is meeting 19-22 February 2006 at Arizona State University in Tempe, AZ to conduct a workshop on water management issues and decision making processes. The KSSD Project seeks to understand and promote the design of effective systems to harness research-based knowledge in support of decisions bearing on the joint goals of human development and environmental stewardship. This KSSD meeting will explore the knowledge systems of water management. Specifically, this workshop aims to bring together a small group of practitioners, researchers and stakeholders from four different basins to help bring out the key issues involved in strategic planning and management of water resources. The four basins of interest are in Yaqui Valley, Mexico; northeast Brazil; the Mae Nam Ping Basin, Thailand; and San Pedro River, Arizona, USA. The workshop is being convened by Jim Buizer, Director, Office of the President for Sustainability Initiatives, Arizona State University. [Report]

Enhancing the Contribution of Research-based Knowledge to the Pursuit of Sustainability. 12 October 2005. Panel session at the Open Meeting of the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change Research Community - "Global Environmental Change, Globalization and International Security: New Challenges for the 21st Century", 9-13 October 2005, Bonn, Germany. [Panel and paper abstracts | Panel and paper presentation slides]

Many governments and commentators believe that science and technology should play a larger role in sustainable development. There is, however, only a very modest level of scholarship and understanding about how to enhance this capacity. We believe that a promising way forward is to frame the knowledge-to-action challenge in terms of knowledge systems. “Knowledge systems” are viewed as consisting of a network of linked actors, organizations, and objects that perform a number of knowledge-related functions (including research, innovation, development, demonstration, deployment, and adoption) that link knowledge and know-how with action. The “kinds” of knowledge include “formal” knowledge produced by the natural and social sciences, “clinical” knowledge found in engineering and medicine, and “tacit” knowledge of practitioners. There is no presumption that “knowledge systems” are the result of some master design. But we do assume that such systems, however they came into being, can be at least partially understood and manipulated in ways that improve their performance. Within this framework we can ask: What are the characteristics of effective knowledge systems? Is it possible to enhance the role of research-based knowledge in such systems without undermining the relevance of solutions to practitioners? Can different forms and sources of knowledge be combined for more appropriate solutions? How can innovation in the service of sustainability be fostered? This panel brought together a very diverse set of case studies of knowledge systems that each explore how the contribution of research-based knowledge to the pursuit of sustainability could be enhanced. The following papers were included in this session:

Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development Project Team Research Meeting. 6-11 September 2005. Saguaro Lake Ranch, Mesa, AZ, USA.

Investigators and research fellows of the Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development Project held a team research meeting 6-11 September 2005 in Mesa, Arizona.

Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development Project Team Research Meeting. 27 October - 1 November 2004. San Carlos Plaza Hotel, San Carlos, Sonora, Mexico.

Investigators and research fellows of the Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development Project held a team research meeting 27 October - 1 November 2004 in San Carlos, Mexico.

Decision Support Systems for Seasonal to Interannual Climate Forecasting Workshop. 5-8 May 2004. Arnold and Mabel Beckman Center, U.S. National Academy of Sciences, Irvine, CA, USA. [Workshop report]

A workshop on "Decision Support Systems for Seasonal to Interannual Climate Forecasting" was held 5-8 May 2004 in Irvine, CA, and co-sponsored by NOAA's Office of Global Programs and the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. The goal of the workshop was to draw lessons about the design of effective decision support systems from the last decade's experience with the production and application of seasonal/interannual climate forecasts. The cases included forecasting for malaria control in Colombia; agriculture and water management in Céara, Brazil; Hawai'i and the Pacific Islands/Pacific ENSO Applications Center; agriculture in Queensland, Australia; and water management in the U.S. Pacific Northwest. Workshop participants were drawn from three communities: users of seasonal/interannual climate forecasts (including managers, policy makers, and planners); producers of such forecasts (including researchers, modelers, applications specialists, etc.); and program managers involved in the funding and support of decision support efforts. The workshop findings will be published by the U.S. National Academies and provide input to NOAA and its effort to design a National Climate Service. William Clark at Harvard University chairs the Steering Committee and David Cash at Harvard University and James Buizer at Arizona State University convened the workshop.

International Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development Workshop. 15-16 April 2004. Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.

A workshop on "International Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development" was held 15-16 April 2004 at Harvard University sponsored by the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs and Center for International Development. The purpose of the workshop was to advance understanding regarding the effectiveness of alternative institutional arrangements. The workshop pursued this goal through a comparative approach involving scholars with expertise in a variety of sectoral and national research and innovation systems. The workshop built upon the results of the research seminar on "Knowledge for Development." A workshop report will contribute to ongoing policy-level deliberations of both the Roundtable on Science and Technology for Sustainability's Task Force on Knowledge for Development of the U.S. National Academies (comprised of the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, Institute of Medicine, and National Research Council) and the UN Millennium Project’s Task Force on Science, Technology and Innovation. The workshop was chaired by William Clark and Kelly Sims Gallagher at Harvard University.

Research Seminar on Knowledge for Development. Fall 2003 and Spring 2004. Center for International Development, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.

Hosted by Harvard's Center for International Development, the Knowledge for Development Research Seminar reviewed the experience with "knowledge systems" - organized efforts to harness science and technology in support of social goals - in an attempt to understand whether there are common features to their successes and failures that can be used in improving the performance of other knowledge systems around the world. The 2003-2004 seminar focused on identifying lessons learned within specific sectors of international development, including agriculture, health, energy, manufacturing, climate forecasting, military R&D, and fisheries. The seminar was chaired by William Clark at Harvard University.

Governance and Information in a Multi-level World: Linking S&T and Decision-making for Ecosystem Assessment and Management. 18 March 2004. Panel session at the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment’s conference on Bridging Scales and Epistemologies: Linking Local Knowledge and Global Science in Multi-scale Assessments, 17-20 March 2004, Alexandria, Egypt.

The study and practice of ecosystem assessment and management increasingly recognize the importance of scale and cross-scale dynamics in understanding and addressing human and environmental change. For many human-environment issues, scientific communities, policy makers, and managers struggle with questions such as: How can we structure assessments of large-scale environmental change to integrate with decision making at multiple levels simultaneously? Who should participate in such activities to assure salience for decision makers, scientific credibility, and political legitimacy for multiple audiences and different levels? How should authority and responsibility to assess and manage environmental problems be apportioned at different levels? What are the implications for data collection, standardization, and analysis when information originates, is produced and is translated across multiple levels? Efforts to address these questions, including the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA), characterize the rapidly evolving landscape of assessment and governance practice and scholarship. Recent contributions have addressed the institutional dimensions of scale and cross-scale dynamics as they relate to resilience, institutional interplay, management of commons, assessment, polycentricity, panarchy, distributed knowledge-action systems, global science and local knowledge, sustainability science, and the role of information institutions in multi-level systems. What is missing from these parallel efforts is a systematic way of thinking about and addressing the challenges involved in integrating science and policy across multiple levels. The panel on "Governance and Information in a Multi-level World" discussed a framework for understanding the institutional dimensions of linking knowledge and action across multiple levels. The papers presented examine: institutions as bridges that can help manage the boundaries between levels; the interaction of markets, governance, and local through global communities; the vertical interplay of institutions between global, regional, national and subnational levels; and institutions that integrate globally situated knowledge and place-based knowledge. The panel also focused on the implications of current research on scale and cross-scale dynamics for the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment.

Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development Project Team Research Meeting. 20-23 January 2004. Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai, Thailand.

Investigators and research fellows of the Knowledge Systems for Sustainable Development Project held a team research meeting 20-23 January 2004 in Chiang Mai, Thailand. The project identified nine hypotheses or propositions relevant to the question, what makes some knowledge systems more effective than others in harnessing science and technology to the goals of sustainable development? The project then explored generalizations about "what works" in the design of effective knowledge systems by comparing knowledge systems for coastal zone management focused on shrimp farming in Thailand, Mexico, Honduras, and Nicaragua.

Scale and Cross-Scale Dynamics for Research and Management. 19-20 October 2003. Side meeting at the Open Meeting of the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change Research Community: Taking Stock and Moving Forward, 16-18 October 2003, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

The Scale and Cross-Scale Dynamics for Research and Management meeting examined the research on the implications of scale and cross-scale dynamics on environment-development issues focusing on management, institutions, and the role of information/knowledge. The workshop was convened by David Cash at Harvard University. Participants included: Neil Adger, University of East Anglia, UK; Fikret Berkes, University of Manitoba, Canada; Po Garden and Louis Lebel, Chiang Mai University, Thailand; Per Olsson, Stockholm University, Sweden; Lowell Pritchard, Emory University, USA; and Oran Young, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA. A number of papers were presented, including:

 

Return to Events listing without descriptions

 

Home | Overview | People | Events | Documents | Links | Private | Search | Contact Us

Contact the webmaster with any comments, questions, or problems.
Copyright © 2006 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. All rights reserved. Report copyright infringements.
Last Modified:  07 June 2007 09:18:00 -0400