In an era where research is increasingly expected to address pressing societal and environmental challenges, a new study by Susanne Koch and Judit Varga critically examines what how social scientists working on forests and seas practice ‘relevant’ research, and what accounts for differences in the orientations of these fields. The article has been published in Minerva.

Based on a comparative analysis of forest policy research and marine social sciences, the study explores how these fields study governance and human-nature relations from socio-ecological perspectives, and how they orient research towards different societal and policy demands. Drawing on Bourdieusian field theory and ethnographic methods, it empirically traces scholars’ epistemic commitments, i.e. their understandings of what kind of research matters in the midst of environmental change and the practical contributions they seek to make. 

The study shows how the fields’ specific historical trajectories shape scientific orientations to societal and policy actors, influencing knowledge production and understandings of what ‘counts’ as meaningful contribution. While forest policy research has traditionally been shaped by its ties to forestry and political science, marine social sciences have evolved with a stronger emphasis on social justice and critique of marine governance. The study highlights how the fields’ specific historical trajectories and resulting relations with societal and policy actors lead to differences in relevance practices and levels of reflexivity and contestation.

By uncovering these dynamics, the study advances research on the interplay of knowledge and values in interdisciplinary environmental fields. Its findings inform current debates on the role of science in socio-ecological transformations taking place in both fields and in wider science policy discourses. The study aligns with the aim of the In-Forest project to shed light on how social and epistemic structures in forest science relate.

The article has been published as part of the Special Issue “Modes of Relevance in Research. Towards Understanding the Promises and Possibilities of Doing Relevance” guest edited by an international team of science scholars in Minerva - A Review of Science, Learning and Policy.

Full reference of the article (available open access):
Koch, S., Varga, J. (2024). All that Matters are Forests and Seas? Practising Relevance in Interdisciplinary Environment-Focused Social Science Fields. Minerva. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-024-09556-w