In the rapidly developing urban regions around the globe, the opportunity to link local urban development with actions targeted to prevent ecological catastrophe has become an imperative. Cities situated in geographical locations characterized by changing water regimes, such as flood exposed urban sites in deltas, on the coast, or along rivers, are particularly critical. Suggesting prevention or adaptation measures in these sites requires a process of interaction between diverse governmental bodies, civil society, and private actors – which is not easy in times of economic and political turbulence. Hence our commitment aims to activate stakeholder involvement and to facilitate a multidirectional knowledge transfer, recognizing the various levels of interactions necessary to advance both knowledge and action on site, within an ever-decreasing local government budget, and an ever increasing complexity of issues to be addressed by ever more tailor-made strategies – this prompts the quest for new knowledge transfer methodologies, responsive to both the local sites/ locally active site actors, and the global knowledge community/ globally active researchers. The question is then if sustainable socio-territorial transformation can be supported by a co-transfer of knowledge, catering to the different demands? Such a transfer concept relies on the co-creation of urban transformation knowledge while also involving the co-creators in the act of continuously translating their knowledge to each other and to different socio-political contexts and geographical locations. @en

The urban conditions of many metropolitan regions in the Global South are marked by growing informal settlements, growing inequalities, and socio-spatial fragmentation. They face alterations of their natural-spatial context imposed by climate change and new hydrological patterns. Knowledge is needed to direct their transformation toward more sustainable futures. Academia plays an important role in this knowledge production process that bridges disciplines and geographies. It ensures links to professional actors, public authorities, and civil society in their respective localities. This chapter introduces the adaptation of a more collaborative, trans-disciplinary, and multi-directional working method called “Beyond Best Practice” that raises research questions around ever-evolving, multi-actor collaborations from a design thinking perspective. These research experiences allowed us to promote an open-ended, co-transfer thematic, and methodological knowledge process by developing and testing ideas in real-world laboratory situations. Its results can be redirected to the Global North, where patterns of informality increasingly characterize hotspots of critical urbanity and, in turn, would benefit from knowledge sourced in the Global South.@en