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Short abstract:

We explore what constitutes relevant environmental knowledge by paying attention to the temporal dimensions of knowledge. Our analysis identifies how different knowledge actors value different kinds of scientific knowledge, why their valuation differs, and what can be done to reconcile differences.

Long abstract:

In this article, we unearth an epistemic tension between scientists and other knowledge actors around the definition of relevant knowledge, by paying attention to the temporal dimensions of knowledge. We investigate this tension through a case study where different knowledge actors are concerned with the rapid decline of the Dutch national bird, the Black-tailed Godwit. We analyze the temporal dimension of relevant knowledge as a powerful way to identify not only how different knowledge actors value different kinds of knowledge (systems, target, and transformation knowledge) (Grunwald, 2004; Weiland et al., 2017), but also why their knowledge valuations differ. Based on this analysis, we explain first how the timescapes (encompassing relations to various temporal dimensions such as timeline, temporality, timeframe, urgency, and pace) in which knowledge actors operate shape their understanding of relevant knowledge. We do this by identifying two different timescapes at work: epistemic trajectorism and simultaneity. Second, we discuss how different approaches to various temporal dimensions, and thus different understandings of relevant scientific knowledge, can coexist and/or get aligned. We further develop the call for transformative science (Schneidewind et al., 2016), which goes beyond a single and dominant type of scientific knowledge (systems knowledge) and diversifies the outcomes (target and transformation knowledge). We do so by arguing that transformative science can be better established through the reconfiguration of knowledge infrastructures for a temporally situated science that allows for the co-existence and/or alignment of different knowledge actors’ timescapes.