Practising co-production and interdisciplinarity: Challenges and implications for one health research

• Published in: Preventive veterinary medicine Vol. 177; p. 104949
• Main Authors: Barnett, Tony, Pfeiffer, Dirk Udo, Ahasanul Hoque, Md, Giasuddin, Mohammad, Flora, Meerjady Sabrina, Biswas, Paritosh Kumar, Debnath, Nitish, Fournié, Guillaume
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 01.04.2020; Elsevier Scientific Publishing
• Subjects: Animals; Biological Science Disciplines; Biological Science Disciplines - methods; Biological Sciences; Discourses; Epidemiologic Methods; Epidemiologic Methods - veterinary; epidemiology; funding; health policy; Humans; Interdisciplinary; interdisciplinary research; Life Sciences; Local epidemiology; One Health; One Health initiative; Participatory epidemiology; Santé publique et épidémiologie; Social Sciences; Social Sciences - methods; supply chain; Value chains; Veterinary Medicine; Veterinary Medicine - methods; zoonoses; Local epidemiology; Social sciences; Discourses; Participatory epidemiology; Interdisciplinary; Research; Value chains; Local epidemiology Participatory epidemiology Discourses Interdisciplinary Research Social sciences
• ISSN: 0167-5877; 1873-1716; 1873-1716; 0167-5877
• DOI: 10.1016/j.prevetmed.2020.104949

We review the nature of interdisciplinary research in relation to One Health, a perspective on human-animal health which would appear to merit close interdisciplinary cooperation to inform public health policy. We discuss the relationship between biological sciences, epidemiology and the social sciences and note that interdisciplinary work demands attention be given to a range of often neglected epistemological and methodological issues. Epidemiologists may sometimes adopt social science techniques as “bolt-ons”11A few words in this paper are placed in quotation marks “…”. This is to indicate that such words are problematic, disputed, colloquial or may require clarification as between different epistemic communities. to their research without having a complete understanding of how the social sciences work. The paper introduces a range of social science concepts and applies them to the challenges of understanding and practicing participatory and local epidemiology. We consider the problem of co-production of knowledge about One Health and zoonotic diseases in relation to funding structures, working in large international teams and explore some of the often-neglected realities of working across disciplines and cultures. We do this in part by applying the concept of value-chain to the research process.