TRANSECTS Operating Principles

TRANSECTS is a research training collaborative/community of practice involving academic researchers and administrators, teachers, students, early career researchers, professionals, and practitioners. Ten principles guide how we work together in a community of practice. We will continuously review and revise these principles as we gain more experience working together.

We honour the self-determination of our partners and recognize that past research has often undermined the rights and responsibilities of Indigenous, traditional, rural, and local peoples. At its foundations, TRANSECTS will honour these rights and responsibilities.

TRANSECTS members seek to act as role models for the values we uphold and the change we seek. Therefore, in addition to the foundational commitment to honour the rights and responsibilities of Indigenous, traditional, and rural peoples, we will uphold and demonstrate the following ten principles for working together.

1. Build and nurture respectful and trusting relationships across a diverse collective

All members are learners; we thrive by bringing together the diverse standpoints, knowledges, skills, and competencies of team members. Doing so requires conscious effort to build and sustain trusting relationships. Building and nurturing respectful and trusting relationships goes beyond expected professional conduct. It means taking time to learn the wants, needs, and perspectives of diverse partners with a view to addressing them. Free, prior, and informed consent must be obtained before any research begins. Additionally, we expect to learn what local and Indigenous people view as ethical research beyond formal requirements and commit to addressing those expectations. We also build trust within our partnership by recognizing the diverse skills and capacities of team members and drawing on them strategically to enhance the work of the partnership.

2. Take responsibility and demonstrate mutual accountability

All applicants, collaborators and partners have agreed to tasks associated with the partnership.  They are expected to contribute their fair share. Responsibility and accountability will be enhanced by the articulation of clear roles and responsibilities, transparency in decision making, and with information that is readily available within, across, and beyond the organization. Decisions of the partnership will be made according to transparent criteria, with effective and responsible communication, to ensure completion of necessary tasks and that our communications support and engage one another.

3. Co-produce and share knowledge throughout the partnership

Recognizing that all participants are both teachers and learners, we will work together to generate and share our learnings. Results are to be shared openly across and beyond the partnership for the benefit of the community of practice. This includes providing submissions to the resource platform and to knowledge mobilizers in the partnership (e.g., UNESCO commissions, SDSN), ensuring academic articles and other outputs are open access, and that contributions of all members are appropriately acknowledged.

4. Pursue reciprocal benefits and relevance for all partners

Too often researchers have conducted work with partners outside of academia, while retaining information and other benefits for themselves. We want to ensure that the work of the partnership is relevant to the needs of communities we engage and that all participants in the partnership receive benefits. In short, research training and outputs must benefit partners beyond academia.

5. Advance equity, diversity, and inclusion through our structures and processes

We welcome diverse contributors to TRANSECTS and seek to provide an inclusive environment that offers equitable opportunities and fair sharing of responsibilities. As the partnership is both international and intercultural, there will be rich and varied interpretations of diversity and inclusion. We encourage the establishment of local protocols that advances equity, diversity and inclusion in recruitment, participants’ experiences, and decision-making; cultivate a safe and welcoming work environment; provide respectful and open debate and decision-making practices; and recognize and celebrate diversity. We aim to ensure that participants are fairly included in decision making and that resources of the partnership are shared fairly. We commit to creating spaces for participation where all participants are welcome to share their skills and perspectives and their contributions are valued and celebrated. We seek to identify and honour the strengths people bring to ensure that participants and tasks are ‘fit for purpose’ so individual members – and the partnership as a whole – shine. We also seek to ensure that ongoing training and research meet expectations of equity, diversity and inclusion.

6. Commit to decolonization and reconciliation

Each country has a different history; it is incumbent upon participants to understand the histories where they live or work and how prior experience may affect contemporary research and training. In some countries, this will include understanding the history and legacy of colonization or war, along with a willingness to work with rural and Indigenous Peoples in the spirit of decolonization, reconciliation, and/or commemoration.

7. Employ careful, responsible, and responsive language and communication

Communication is more than simply providing information. We are a broad community of practice where partners come from different cultural traditions, institutions, and languages. We need to engage in communication carefully and responsibly, attending to communication media, styles, and languages to ensure all partners understand our intentions and our actions. We understand that we may need to spend time unpacking our language as our words contain unconscious bias that may not be mutually understood. We are keen to learn new “languages” and ways of expressing or understanding sustainability challenges. While we operate primarily in English, we recognize that sometimes our use of language can be hurtful and/or exclusive. As we learn about these instances, we will modify our language accordingly. For example, we reject the use of “targets” and “targeting”, we employ the terminology of “shared responsibility holders” instead of “stakeholders”, and we replace “focus groups” with “sharing circles” or “workshops”.

8. Seek learning and welcome adaptation

All participants in TRANSECTS – researchers, students, professionals, and practitioners – are learners in the partnership. All participants are also teachers. We form a community of practice rooted in a desire to share learning and improve practice. We come together in the spirit of learning and critical reflection, including reflection (involving unlearning and relearning) on our own assumptions, biases, and practices. We may need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. We will engage in pilot initiatives and experimentation with the express purpose of learning from them and adapting to changing conditions. We will regularly monitor and evaluate our practices against our goals, share results, and seek feedback. We welcome the opportunity to learn from one another and do so by providing constructive and meaningful support of one another. We also commit to using what we learn to adapt our structures and processes throughout the duration of the partnership to advance effective and equitable outcomes.

9. Advocate for institutional change in support of transdisciplinary research and teaching

We commit to applying what we learn to make change in the institutions where we work. For those in academia, we will pilot and evaluate new metrics and policies to support and recognize the success of transdisciplinary scholars and research. We will use our results to advocate for institutional changes for students and researchers that embrace transdisciplinarity, including financial, logistical, and wellness supports; supervisory training; new program policies; and improved communication and recognition strategies.

10. Participate in self-care and joyful exchange

We commit to developing this partnership so that all participants have opportunities for professional and personal development. This means equitable access to mentors, resources, and opportunities for learning. It also means being attentive to the need for self-care to avoid excessive workload and burnout. We also commit to acknowledging the contributions of each participant and bringing joy by celebrating one another and our successes (and our learnings) as a team.