3.2.1. Some considerations regarding indicators of evaluation for interdisciplinary research projects

- There is a central conflict on whether there should be fix indicators to evaluate an interdisciplinary project or whether they should be created ad-hoc. Maybe a negotiation between the two positions would be useful, as it widely coheres with the conflict between funders (fix indicators) and receivers (flexible/ad-hoc indicators).

- There is a crucial question on when we should evaluate – pre- or post- a project, and whether the evaluation in two phases should use the same indicators. There is a crucial difference between the indicators measuring the political impact (media, size, visitors) and the scientific impact (meaning, new knowledge). Both types of indicators are different and have to be treated as different groups.

- There is a difference in how evaluators and evaluated see and understand the meaning of indicators.

- A central topic of indicators in order to evaluate projects circulates between chosen and imposed indicators. A possible way to deal with evaluation would be to combine chosen and imposed indicators, to invite evaluators to understand the self-chosen indicators at the beginning of a project. This would demand to explain the indicators that have been chosen in a way that others can understand their use value. However, the evaluation and consequently the negotiation process between chosen and imposed indicators might need to take place twice – at the beginning and at the end of the research. The researcher should have the chance to explain why he/she sees other indicators valuable for evaluating his/her research at the end.