For interdisciplinary research to truly create “qualitative” changes!

Interdisciplinary research in science, especially social sciences and humanities, is now considered an inevitable and necessary trend to solve practical problems. However, the current problem is to understand the true nature of interdisciplinary research and find solutions to effectively implement interdisciplinary research programs. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Ngoc - Director of the Institute of Vietnamese Studies and Development (VNU) talked with VNU Magazine on this topic.

Interdisciplinary research: starting with understanding the concept correctly

- When was the concept of interdisciplinary research mentioned, Professor?-Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Ngoc: It can be seen that the more science develops, the more specialized fields are divided into smaller ones to gain a deeper understanding of things and phenomena. That is the normal and inevitable path of development. However, when it has been divided too small and gone too deep, it is no longer easy to re-understand things and phenomena as a whole system. The requirement for the development of science is that the process of specialization and specialization must go hand in hand with the process of expanding connections, interpenetrating, and blending together among scientific fields. The interdisciplinary approach arose in such a context and is increasingly becoming an important trend in the world as well as in Vietnam.- So, according to Professor, what should we understand the nature of interdisciplinary research to be?-Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Ngoc: People talk a lot about interdisciplinary but I have the feeling that sometimes they do not really understand the nature of interdisciplinary! Interdisciplinary simply means using simultaneously, truly objectively and equally many specialized methods, to be exact, two or more specialized methods, to perceive a certain object or phenomenon. I would like to give a typical example of interdisciplinary research as follows: When researching Thang Long citadel (Hanoi) according to the traditional historical method, we only need to exploit and systematize ancient sources of documents about this citadel, then describe and comment on its scale, structure, role and position in history. If we stop here, our perception of Thang Long citadel will inevitably be vague and even sometimes incorrect. Since the archaeological excavation at 18 Hoang Dieu, the western area of ​​Thang Long Forbidden City was discovered, historians have had the opportunity to cooperate with archaeologists, cultural scientists, architectural researchers, paleontologists, paleogeographers, etc. to discuss, compare, and contrast with similar citadels in the country and around the world, etc., and have accurately and comprehensively determined not only the location, scale, and structure of the citadel, but also its unique values ​​and outstanding global values. The new scientific achievements about Thang Long Citadel are typical products of interdisciplinary research, which only a few years ago, no scientist could have imagined. It can be said that only when specialized perceptions are blended together to create “qualitative” changes in scientific perceptions, is it truly interdisciplinary.- So interdisciplinary research also has many different "levels" and "steps" and must necessarily be associated with the organization of research groups, Professor?-Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Ngoc: Interdisciplinary also has different levels of breadth and narrowness, and the level of interdisciplinary research depends on the ability to simultaneously, comprehensively and effectively use many specific methods for a research object and bring about a common scientific awareness. The most difficult thing about the interdisciplinary method is that it requires people to use many different methods at the same time, but no method is considered the main method, and no method is considered only supplementary. Therefore, interdisciplinary research is rarely applied to individual research topics, but is often organized into interdisciplinary research groups. The interdisciplinary research group will include a number of experts from different fields of expertise, but must truly understand and respect each other, and work together to research a common object. In a group, the group leader must be a leader who is not only capable of organizing and leading the group to work in the right direction, but must also know how to listen to different opinions, and must know how to synthesize and conclude to find the essence of the phenomenon, even though it may be expressed in many contradictory aspects.- In the field of social sciences and humanities, how important is interdisciplinary research, Professor?-Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Ngoc: Social sciences and humanities, in the most general terms, are the sciences of humans and social life. In the process of Industrialization, Modernization, Openness and International Integration, our Party advocates “taking the development of human resources as the fundamental factor for rapid and sustainable development”, and social sciences and humanities have been placed in their proper, very high position. The problem is whether social sciences and humanities have risen to fulfill their noble functions and missions or not. Thus, social sciences and humanities contribute to correctly assessing the current state of society and helping policy makers find directions for national development. For example, in the mid-1980s, the policy of reforming the organization and management of rural areas and agriculture fundamentally changed the face of the country, turning Vietnam from a poor country into the second largest rice exporter in the world. This century-long achievement has a very important role for social sciences and humanities. However, it can also be thought that if the research is not thorough and the advice for major decisions is not correct, social sciences and humanities must also be responsible for the immeasurable damage to people and society. Large-scale research programs on people, communities, society and culture, comprehensive research topics, determining the development strategy of a region, a sector... must definitely be interdisciplinary research programs.- So what are the basic difficulties facing interdisciplinary research in social sciences and humanities today, Professor?-Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Ngoc: Doing social sciences and humanities as an objective science is already very difficult, doing interdisciplinary research in social sciences and humanities in a systematic and truly scientific way is much more difficult. For those who are familiar with specialized and in-depth research, it is even more difficult. We have entered interdisciplinary research slowly, without adequate investment and almost no experience in organizing interdisciplinary research. Many scientific programs called interdisciplinary have been implemented in recent years, but in fact they are only multidisciplinary research or interdisciplinary research in its early stages. Meanwhile, social life is posing too many requirements that need to be answered by interdisciplinary methods, and only interdisciplinary methods are capable of solving them. I think it is time for the state to have a strategy for developing interdisciplinary sciences, to invest appropriately so that interdisciplinary sciences can have the conditions to promote their advantages to meet the increasingly high demands of society.

Lack of people trained to do interdisciplinary research

- Professor, some people say that we are lacking people doing interdisciplinary research. So how can we have a team of many good experts in interdisciplinary research?-Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Ngoc: The demand for interdisciplinary research is increasing day by day and thus requires a growing team of professional interdisciplinary research experts. The normal development trend of science is to become more and more specialized, to go deeper and deeper into the nature of things and phenomena, but to fully and correctly perceive all those things and phenomena, it is impossible not to integrate them again. So who will do the work of reintegrating, when science has gone too deep, too far? Don't think that a good expert in a specific field can easily solve interdisciplinary problems. I think, on the contrary, experts who are too deep in a field will have even more difficulty participating in interdisciplinary research, because specialized methods have become flesh and blood, how can they be changed immediately? I have only been doing ancient and medieval Vietnamese history for more than thirty years, and now I am assigned to build interdisciplinary Vietnamese studies. Actually, it is because of the assigned responsibility that I have to try, because before and after I am still just a historian. Perhaps other experts are the same, once they have gone deep into their own field of expertise, it is difficult for them to devote all their efforts to interdisciplinary work. So I think we must consider training interdisciplinary specialists as soon as possible. We must have a plan to train interdisciplinary specialists in a formal and systematic manner right from the beginning. It is also necessary to know that not everyone can be trained to become interdisciplinary specialists, but it is necessary to select people with general scientific qualities, who are capable of organizing, managing and working in interdisciplinary groups. I believe that many young cadres from our class, if they are truly dedicated, supported by policies and when they have mastered modern technology, they will certainly succeed.Associate Professor, Dr. Nguyen Hai Ke - Head of the History Department - commented that: Many famous research works of great names in Vietnamese science have become "classics" because they used interdisciplinary research methods and integrated interdisciplinary scientific knowledge. So why were previous generations of scientists able to do things that we now consider difficult?-Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Ngoc: It must be said that the level of specialized science at that time was not as high and profound as it is today. In the newly established period of social sciences and humanities, many fields were still linked together into a unified block in the style of "Literature - History - Philosophy are inseparable". Scientists at that time were trained, worked and matured in a comprehensive academic environment, so they had more favorable conditions for interdisciplinary work than now. When implementing research topics in a certain field, they started from a very broad and solid background and foundation to go into in-depth research, and then from that in-depth research, they further consolidated and strengthened the background and foundation that was already strong before. With the extraordinary efforts of the most dedicated and devoted people, overcoming the difficulties and limitations of the pioneering period, they skillfully combined their profound knowledge with the new achievements of in-depth research, forming "classic" works as Associate Professor, Doctor of Science Nguyen Hai Ke once mentioned. I suddenly remembered the poem written by Che Lan Vien during the fiercest days of the resistance war against the US to save the country: "The era is over, Dinh Bo Linh / We cannot use reed flags to fight the enemy.”. Times today are no longer the same as in the 30s, 40s, and 50s of the 20th century. Difficulties have changed, advantages are not the same as before, and the requirements of interdisciplinary research in a scientific context where specialization is too deep require us to have a different approach. So how can we clearly explain why our generation could do it while our generation could not? What I hope is that the next generation, with better conditions and more capacity, will be able to do more valuable interdisciplinary research than our predecessors.- Through the opinions that the Professor presented above, it can be clearly seen that the story of interdisciplinary research is essentially a story about vision, awareness as well as organizational and management capabilities?-Prof. Dr. Nguyen Quang Ngoc: That's right. I believe that the position and role of social sciences and humanities and interdisciplinary research in social sciences and humanities are increasingly recognized more clearly and accurately. Many major scientific problems of the country, of sectors, regions and localities can only be solved by interdisciplinary research. However, to have truly systematic and effective interdisciplinary research, there must be a development strategy, there must be appropriate investment, there must be knowledge of organization and management, and there must be a plan to train and foster a team of experts doing interdisciplinary research. I think that compared to all scientific research and university and postgraduate training institutions nationwide, only Hanoi National University has a distinct advantage to take the lead in research, training, building an interdisciplinary academic environment and implementing large, valuable interdisciplinary scientific programs serving the cause of Industrialization, Modernization, Openness and International Integration of the country.