Multicriteria Assessment and Communication of Effects of Organic Food Systems

Organic agriculture is an alternative food system based on consumer trust and credibility. Consumers buy organic goods and citizens and politician support organics, to some degree, because they believe it is a better alternative. And they believe this because the organic form of production seeks to meet many considerations for society, nature and environment. The possibilities for growth in organic agriculture therefore depends on whether it, overall, makes a credible and attractive alternative, and whether the development of organics is positive with regard to organic principles and the key societal goals for environment, health and welfare. It is, however, extremely difficult to determine whether a specific technological, management or organizational development is positive or negative, overall. In other words, if we want to assess and evaluate organic food systems (or aspects thereof) it becomes evident that it is indeed not possible to base such an assessment solely on one criterion. We need multiple criteria; there are however, no established methods with which to conduct overall, multicriteria assessments or organic food systems

Animating Multicriteria Decision-making Processes in the Organic Value Chain

When thinking about animations, an intuitive reaction could be to dismiss them as mere children’s pastime, but that is by no means the whole picture. Animated films featuring highly specialized knowledge from, say, the domains of science, technology and engineering are to be found all over the current media landscape. There is a tendency that they are predominantly used in one specific communicative constellation, i.e., when domain-specific knowledge is communicated from an expert or authority to a lay person. That, too, is the case when it comes to the animated film “MultiTrust” (to be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmoXYJAS8LY ). This animation stems from the research project “Multicriteria assessment and communication of effects of organic food systems” (http://multitrust.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Description-of-MultiTrust-from-Status-report-2011-to-Organic-RDD.pdf), which was conducted under the auspices of ICROFS (i.e., the International Centre for Research in Organic Food Systems, for more information please visit: http://www.icrofs.org/index.html). The color animation film was produced in 2013 by the award-wining Danish production company and animation studio Tumblehead Aps (for more information please visit: http://www.tumblehead.com/). A primary intention of this multifaceted research project was to “make it easier for consumers […] to observe and evaluate the different contributions that organic food systems offer”, with a special emphasis “to promote communication, participation and learning” about organic foods. One tangible result of this endeavor was the animated film aiming at presenting a novel way of communicating about multicriteria buyer decision-making with regards to organic food purchases. Whereas the film as such does not present a tool ready to be employed in the service of consumer communication, it does present a prototype for how we might design future communications about organic food products in a novel way

Organizational Knowledge Communication – a Nascent 3rd Order Disciplinarity

There is an emerging tendency that the organizational communication functions of larger companies enter into a symbiotic relationship with the companies’ Knowledge Management function. A tendency this journal has labelled Organizational Knowledge Communication. This should come as no surprise to neither the researcher nor the practitioner; after all who can say where a corporation’s knowledge work ends and where its organizational communication begins – and vice versa? In this paper I will present a theoretical account of the three disciplinary trajectories that, in my view, have given rise to Organizational Knowledge Communication, i.e., organization studies, communication theory and Knowledge Management, respectively. In their synthesis the three trajectories form a disciplinary triple helix, a triple helix which, in turn, gives rise to Organizational Knowledge Communication as a novel, 3rd order disciplinarity. Whereas each discipline is a strand in its own right in the helix, these strands, nevertheless, also allow for disciplinary integration, albeit punctually and dynamically. And it is exactly in such trilateral punctual and dynamic integrations that Organizational Knowledge Communication becomes visible, becomes a disciplinarity. I theoretically present an example of such a punctual integration and point to some of the immediate research promises that it holds. This theoretical account ends by describing Organizational Knowledge Communication as a nascent 3rd order disciplinarity

Knowledge Communication: : Prolegomenon to a Research Programme Inaugural Professorial Lecture, March 16th, 2018

This paper is a thoroughly revised version of the manuscript of my inaugural professorial lecture delivered on March 16th of 2018, when I was called upon to take up the position as full professor at the department of Culture and Learning, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Aalborg in Denmark. As this is a revised version of a talk given four years ago almost to the date, the reader will probably be able to spot remnants of its oral origins. But not only that. As much of what I envisioned in 2018 has been published one way of the other since then, the reader will also be invited to join me on a text archeological expedition. Much like Norman Mailer’s use of (rhetorical) “Time Machines” in his The Naked and the Dead, so will I be making extensive use of references and footnotes as rhetorical wormholes allowing the reader to oscillate between 2018 and today, 2022. This paper is an integration of ideas harvested from over a decade’s worth of research publications within the field that I have labelled Knowledge Communication. Basically, my interest in Knowledge Communication grew out of a curiosity as to the conceptual interfaces between communication and knowledge. As a point of entry suffice it to say that – as seen from the helicopter perspective – what sets Knowledge Communication apart from other related fields of communication studies is the fact that it takes its point of departure in the knowledge society. I.e., not in any specific discourse, neither in any one particular knowledge domain, and not even in communication per se, but in the context encompassing all of this, i.e., the knowledge society.  Structurally, this paper is divided into four sections. In the first section, I will sketch out my personal Bildungsweg and give a brief, narrative account of how my scholarly interests progressed from lexeme to communication. A Bildungsweg that eventually gave rise to a perspectivist outlook. In section 2, I will be presenting my take on the formative force of perspective as well as of interruptions of regress. The results, as it were, of applying interruptions of regress to the disciplines that I was socialized into, i.e., Language for Specific Purpose, Public Understanding of Science, and Knowledge Management, allows me to establish the three Cs of the Knowledge Communication research programme, i.e., communication, convergence, and constructivism, respectively. In section 3, I will present, discuss, and evaluate three widely acknowledged understandings of communication. My critical evaluation of existing understandings of what communication ‘is’ and what it ‘does’ serves as a stepping-stone for conceptualizing a novel take on communication as co-actional. An understanding of communication that is able to encompass the three Cs. In the final section, section 4, I propose fruitful avenues of research stemming from the Knowledge Communication research programme

Editorial for the 4th issue of “Communication and Language at Work – Bridging Theory and Practice”

Editorial for the 4th issue of “Communication and Language at Work – Bridging Theory and Practice

På vej mod en øko-label version 2.0?

Selvom de fleste forbrugere kender til Ø-mærket, er det nok de færreste, der ved, hvad denne label egentlig dækker over. Og det er klart i den økologiske fødevaresektors interesse at sørge for, at forbrugeren får de informationer, han eller hun skal bruge for at vælge fx den økologiske kylling – frem for den langt billigere konventionelt producerede kylling. Denne tanke er basis for projektet ”Multikriteriel vurdering og kommunikation af effekterne af økologiske fødevaresystemer”, MultiTrust. Et mere nuanceret mærkningssystem findes ikke endnu; men kimen er lagt i MultiTrust, der har udviklet en tilgang til øko-lables, der er grundlæggende anderledes, end den vi kender fra fx de statslige øko-mærker

Multikriteriel vurdering og kommunikation af effekterne af økologiske fødevaresystemer

Økologi er et alternativt fødevaresystem, der er baseret på forbrugertillid og troværdighed. Forbrugere køber økologiske varer og borgere og politikere understøtter økologien, i et vist omfang, fordi de mener det er et bedre alternativ. Og det gør de fordi den økologiske driftsform søger at tilgodese mange hensyn til samfund, natur og miljø. Mulighederne for vækst i økologien afhænger således af at den, samlet set, udgør et troværdigt og attraktivt alternativ, og at den udvikler sig positivt i forhold til de økologiske principper og i overensstemmelse med centrale samfundsmæssige målsætninger for miljø, sundhed og velfærd. Det er imidlertid særdeles vanskeligt at afgøre om en bestemt teknologisk, driftsmæssig eller organisatorisk udvikling er positiv eller negativ, samlet set. Med andre ord: Hvis vi ønsker at vurdere og evaluere økologiske fødevaresystemer (eller aspekter af samme), så er det ikke tilstrækkeligt at basere en sådan vurdering alene på et kriterium. Vi har brug for multiple kriterier; men der findes ingen etablerede metoder til at lave helhedsvurderinger af økologiske fødevaresystemer

Methods for Investigating Organizational Knowledge Communication

Methods for Investigating Organizational KnowledgeCommunicatio