“Transdisciplinarity is perhaps above all a new way of thinking about, and engaging in, inquiry”.(Montuori, 2008, p.ix) 

Transdisciplinary research (TR) today is focused on designing and implementing solutions to emerging ‘real-world’ (Segalàs & Tejedor, 2013), complex [1] issues, such as social inequalities, poverty and hunger, climate change, ecosystem destruction and exhaustion of natural resources etc. Such issues are referred to as ‘wicked problems’ (Brown et al., 2010), as they defy complete definition and cannot be solved using existing modes of inquiry and decision making (Bernstein, 2015), but rather need creative solutions and approaches.  

TR attempts a new model of knowledge-production, involving work that creatively re-imagines the disciplines and the possibilities for combining them (Castán Broto et al., 2002). In studying simultaneously what is between, across, and beyond disciplines (McGregor, 2015), it exceeds the boundaries of academic community and relies on stakeholder involvement, hence on the interconnections between the academy, industry, governments, and non-governmental organizations (Bernstein, 2015), leading to an engaged, socially responsible science. 

TR prioritises collaborative problem-oriented research for the ‘common good’ (Klein, 2013) [2]. In extension, it fundamentally transcends the dichotomy between objective and subjective viewpoints, as well as redefines the role of the researcher-expert and the subject of research within the research process. In bringing in the subjects of research participating in the research on an equal footing with the investigators, sharing the creation of the work, it not only creates a dialogue between minority and majority cultures (Bernstein, 2015), but also produces more accurate, representative and informed research outputs and solutions.  

Alluded to above and understanding that TR work is an open-ended learning process without predetermined outcomes (Pohl et al., 2021), an essential characteristic of TR is the creative, imaginative and lateral thinking of solutions, but most importantly of combinations of factors, tools and methods. This requires the engagement with new modes of thinking and practicing, incorporating new technologies and fields of investigation. In other words, it requires the abandoning of one’s intellectual comfort zone, in which process “we can see the potential for frustration and pain as well as for the exhilaration that comes from seeing things in a new way” (Bernstein, 2015, p.11). 

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[1]  In a complex system, the individual components interact with each other and with their environment in such a way that the system as a whole cannot be explained in terms of its parts.

[2] This definition lies at the heart of the Swiss-based Transdisciplinarity Net (td-net) (http://www.transdisciplinarity.ch/e/index.php) (Klein, 2013).