The Routledge Companion to Research in the Arts

some notes on mode 1 and mode 2

On securing housing safety: a transdisciplinary project

Introduction

in this section of the chapter a collaborative research project will be presented and
discussed. When a pilot nordic research course on transdisciplinarity was carried out
in autumn 2003, the participators suggested several improvements for the forthcoming
courses on this issue. among them there was the suggestion that at least one of the
presented transdisciplinary projects should include a recognizable contribution from
some of the creative professions such as architects, landscape architects, planners,
designers or artists. The challenge for future courses on mode 2 was thus not so much
the finding of such a project, but rather making the researchers of that project aware of
the transdisciplinary character of their work.
in sweden, as in other western countries, there is a long tradition of architectural
research being done in collaboration with stakeholders such as national authorities,
municipalities, the construction sector; all more or less involved in housing, building
and planning. There is a wide range of subjects in this field which cross traditional
and professional boundaries (Forty et al. 2006: 42–3). But the great majority of the
swedish architectural research community is not aware of, and consequently does not
recognize, their own work as transdisciplinary. This is probably not only the case in
sweden. if so, a strengthened awareness in this regard could support the position of the
creative professions in mode 2 development.
an architect and professor in urban planning, Björn Klarqvist, collaborated with
a policeman, anders Rydberg and his colleagues, on a project on securing housing
safety in the city in which they lived. The scholar promised to examine their project
in the terms of mode 2 and transdisciplinarity. in the following account, the present
author has made an attempt to abbreviate and retell the story told by the architect
and the policeman. in the closing of this section the architect- scholar then discusses
transdisciplinarity with regard to their own project and in more general terms.

The fairy tale recounted

There was a swedish policeman who always tried to do his best. he looked for order,
protected lawful citizens and apprehended offenders in his district. he was well- liked
by his colleagues and his superiors considered advancing his career. statistics revealed
that crime had been increasing in his district for a long time. it worried the boss of the
policeman, especially because his own boss expected him to provide an explanation for
this development. The mid- level boss remarked to him that one of his policemen was
particularly good at his field work. Thus, a promotion was proposed to him, with a new
position in the administration. That was not what the policeman looked forward to,
as he mostly enjoyed doing field work. so he asked for some time to consider the offer
before accepting the promotion.
When the policeman got a few days off as a compensation for his overtime, he left
for his summer house to think about why crime seemed to grow in volume and why
the policeman’s job resembled a sisyphean task. The perspective of another 30 years
of such a job suddenly seemed less than tempting; a burn- out prospect not too far