td-net, Network for Transdisciplinary Research
(www.transdisiplinarity.ch)

The transdisciplinarity-net project (td-net) of which the SCNAT has the lead since January 1, 2003, is realised in co-operation with the sister academies, with the financial support of the swiss-academies as well as with project-related means of third parties. The network was initiated to further the transdisciplinary tendency in various fields of research. Experiences gained in the research on environment and sustainability serve as basis.
It is part of transdisciplinarity to allow public access to information on the fields of research. Often, however, it is also necessary, to look into society-relevant problems interdisciplinarily and to develop effective strategies for politics, economy and society. For this purpose extensive space and time-dependent processes of different scales require to be researched (knowledge of systems) as well as the related problems of controlling and the possibilities of forming and structuring (knowledge of transformation) have to be evaluated. Moreover, it is necessary to have structures which allow reaching a social consensus on aims (knowledge of aims). The term transdisciplinary in td-net is therefore used for research projects and programmes which deal in socially-relevant problems looking into these with regards to the knowledge of systems, of aims and of transformation and also taking into consideration different social actors.