Knowledge sharing for sustainable development in civil engineering: A systematic review

Sustainable development (SD) knowledge in civil engineering-related disciplines is evolving rapidly. As such, it is increasingly important that engineers share SD knowledge to allow them to systematically enhance the environmental performance of engineered systems. This systematic review identifies published primary data collection studies of SD knowledge sharing (KS) approaches in a civil engineering-related context with the aim of understanding the KS concepts studied, the research strategies used and the key KS findings. A predefined research protocol guided the selection of relevant studies. Analysis revealed that collaboration and education were the major KS concepts and that most studies reside at the positivist end of the research strategy spectrum. Practically all of the identified studies emphasise the need for social interfacing, which enhances the way engineers share complex SD knowledge. The article concludes by describing the practical implications of the research. © 2011 Springer-Verlag London Limited.