2024 Reports

Good Practices in the Co-Production of Knowledge: Working Well Together in Environmental Change Research

Petriello, Michael A.; Aini, John; Amepou, Yolarnie; Anthony, Katrina; Avrami, Erica C.; Badaki, OreOluwa; Bisson, Kelsey; Blair, Mary E.; Bostick, Benjamin C.; Buffington, Sean; Cook, Elizabeth M.; Guild Douglass, Kristina; Gallay, Paul; Goldmark, Sandra; King, Sutton; López, Claudia; Low, Andrea; MacLeod, Eilidh; Mawyer, Alex; Mukherjee, Shinjini; Mylius, Benjamin; Porzecanski, Ana Luz; Richer, Ariel Marie Shirley; Rosenkranz, Naomi; Smith, Pamela H.; Stronza, Amanda; St. George, Lillian; Sulik, Jozef; Subramaniam, Ajit; Supuma, Miriam; Surman, Caroline; Talbert, Rachel; West, Paige; Whiting, Alex V.; Whiting, Siikauraq; Winters, Jacqueline; Zappa, Christopher J.; Zurba, Melanie

This living document proposes good relational practices to support climate change researchers in and beyond the Columbia University Climate School in their efforts to pursue and practice knowledge co-production in their climate-related scholarship, research, and practice. For the purpose of this document, climate researchers are anyone from any background who contributes, in any form, to enhancing our shared understanding, strategies, and responses to climate change. Although this document is focused on research, it also importantly provides communities (Indigenous and non-Indigenous alike), private sector organizations, and others who are carrying out and connected to climate-related work a window into how climate researchers might interact with them, how they can further advocate on their own behalf through the language and aspirations of co-production, and how they can anticipate interacting with researchers through co-production relational way. The document starts with a brief introduction and description of what it does and does not intend to communicate. It then transitions into a framework for good relational practices in knowledge co-production generated through an extensive review of co-production literature in the climate sciences, one-on-one conversations with 9 Columbia University affiliated researchers and practitioners, and a 2.5 day convening with 36 contributors, including Columbia researchers, Indigenous leaders, government representatives, the private sector, and external academics. The framework brings together 28 relational principles and 22 recommended good relational practices, which are summarized under the framework section. The principles and practices are then filtered into 30 reflexive questions, or points of reflection, climate researchers can ask themselves to help use and learn from the good relational practices. The principles, good practices and points of reflection are categorized into 6 interrelated pillars of co-production: The people theme brings attention to the ways in which individual and group identities shape the direction of knowledge co-production efforts. The purpose theme represents the meanings and motivations associated with knowledge co-production. The power theme refers to how power and power relations are understood and enacted through and around efforts to co-produce knowledge. The politics theme centers on the effects of policies and politics on knowledge co-production work at different scales. The pathways theme focuses on tools, approaches, and strategies used to co-produce knowledge in relevant, rigorous, and meaningful ways. The progress theme embodies the broad aspiration that knowledge co-production will catalyze transformative change, whether societal, scientific, cultural, or otherwise. The guidelines are followed with two sections about the motivations for this document and a condensed overview of the history and development of co-production within the environmental and climate sciences. The last section, Steps towards ‘good relational practices’, details how information was gathered and summarized for this document. Drawing from this information, climate researchers are encouraged to use, learn from, and reflect on the information in this document to consider why and how knowledge co-production may or may not be appropriate for their climate-related research.