To co-produce or not to co-produce

As part of the SESYNC project on "The science of knowledge use in decision-making" and led by Maria Carmen Lemos, we have published a piece in Nature Sustainability on the co-production of knowledge between scientistis and decision-makers.

To co-produce or not to co-produce

Researchers, stakeholders and funding organizations have embraced co-production of knowledge to solve sustainability problems. Research focusing on the practice of co-production can help us understand what works in what contexts and how to avoid potentially undesirable outcomes.

In this Comment, we discuss knowledge co-production as a focus of research and as a rapidly spreading practice among scientists, stakeholders and funders seeking to increase the role of science in solving society’s most pressing problems. We write as a group of researchers, stakeholders, funders and co-production practitioners operating at the intersection of knowledge production and use — a space that happily is becoming larger and more crowded. We believe in advancing co-production as an important approach to increasing the impact of science, but we also believe that doing so requires recognizing its limitations and grappling with problems that arise as the practice of co-production becomes more broadly taken up and institutionalized.

Lemos, M. C., Arnott, J. C., Ardoin, N. M., Baja, K., Bednarek, A. T., Dewulf, A., … Wyborn, C. (2018). To co-produce or not to co-produce. Nature Sustainability, 1(12), 722–724. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-018-0191-0