William R. Torbert’s Legacy in Transforming Doctoral Education through Collaborative Developmental Action Inquiry An Intergenerational tribute
Main Article Content
Abstract
This article honors the legacy of William R. Torbert (1944–2025) through an examination of his final collaborative project: a three-year initiative to reimagine doctoral education through Collaborative Developmental Action Inquiry (CDAI). Torbert’s final message, delivered three months before his death, serves as the point of departure for a reflexive exploration of an intergenerational research community of European doctoral students and faculty engaged in non-traditional action research dissertations. We show how Torbert’s concepts of first-, second-, and third-person inquiry/practice, timely action, and developmental friendship shaped our collective work and enabled a more relational, reflexive, and practice-based approach to doctoral development. By reflecting on this emergent inquiry community, we illustrate how CDAI can deepen individual research processes while also supporting institutional shifts toward more participatory and developmental forms of doctoral education. The article concludes with implications and perspectives for universities seeking to cultivate action-research-oriented doctoral cultures.
Keywords: Bill Torbert, action research, collaborative learning, doctoral education, intergenerational learning
El legado de William R. Torbert en la transformación de la formación doctoral mediante la investigación-acción colaborativa para el desarrollo: un homenaje intergeneracional
Este artículo rinde homenaje al legado de William R. Torbert (1944–2025) mediante el análisis de su proyecto colaborativo final: una iniciativa trienal para reimaginar la formación doctoral mediante la Investigación-Acción Colaborativa para el Desarrollo (IADC). El mensaje final de Torbert, pronunciado tres meses antes de su fallecimiento, sirve como punto de partida para una exploración reflexiva de una comunidad de investigación intergeneracional de estudiantes de doctorado y profesorado europeos que participan en tesis doctorales de investigación-acción no tradicionales. Mostramos cómo los conceptos de Torbert de indagación/práctica en primera, segunda y tercera persona, acción oportuna y amistad para el desarrollo moldearon nuestro trabajo colectivo y propiciaron un enfoque más relacional, reflexivo y práctico para el desarrollo doctoral. Al reflexionar sobre esta comunidad de indagación emergente, ilustramos cómo la IADC puede profundizar los procesos de investigación individuales, a la vez que apoya cambios institucionales hacia formas de formación doctoral más participativas y orientadas al desarrollo. El artículo concluye con implicaciones y perspectivas para las universidades que buscan cultivar culturas doctorales orientadas a la investigación-acción.
Palabras clave: Bill Torbert, investigación-acción, aprendizaje colaborativo, formación doctoral, aprendizaje intergeneracional
Bibliography: Gorelick, Carol/van Montfort, Danny/Sanders, Freek/Fehr-Bosshard, Tobias/Hersted, Lone/Coghlan, David: William R. Torbert’s Legacy in Transforming Doctoral Education through Collaborative Developmental Action Inquiry. An Intergenerational tribute, IJAR – International Journal of Action Research, 1-2026, pp. 7-23.
Article Details
Literature
Bradbury, H. (2021). Developmental Friendship in ART. Action Research Plus. https://actionresearchplus.com/pg-developmental-friendships-in-art-with-bill-torbert-and-jean-hartmann.
Bradbury, H. (2025, October 28). In memoriam Bill Torbert: Timely action to the end. Action Research Plus. https://actionresearchplus.com/in-memoriam-bill-torbert-timely-action-to-the-end/
Chandler, D. & Torbert, W. (2003). Transforming inquiry and action: By interweaving 27 flavors of action research. Action Research. 1(2): 133 - 152, 2003.
Coghlan, D. (2010). Interiority as the cutting edge between theory and practice: A first person perspective. International Journal of Action Research, 6 (2+3), 288 - 307
Coghlan, D. (2019). Doing action research in your own organization. Sage.
Coghlan, D. (forthcoming) On becoming an action researcher: Appropriating our heritage. Educational Action Research,
Coghlan, D. & Nzembayie, K.F. (2025). Putting the scholar back into scholarship, the researcher into research, the knower into knowing …: A call to interiority. Management Learning, DOI 10.1177/13505076251377545
Cooperrider, D. L., & Srivastva, S. (1987). Appreciative inquiry in organizational life. In W. Pasmore & R. Woodman (Eds.), Research in organizational change and development (Vol. 1, pp. 129 - 169). JAI Press.
Cooperrider, D. L., Whitney, D., & Stavros, J. M. (2005). Appreciative inquiry handbook: For leaders of change (2nd ed.). Crown Custom Pub.
Cronin, B. (2017). The phenomenology of human understanding. Pickwick.
Cunliffe, A. L. (2004). On becoming a critically reflexive practitioner. Journal of Management Education, 28(4), 407 - 426. https://doi.org/10.1177/1052562904264440
Erfan, A., & Torbert, W. R. (2015). Collaborative developmental action inquiry. In H. Bradbury (Ed.), The SAGE handbook of action research (3rd ed., pp. 64 - 75). SAGE Publications.
Gearty, M. R., & Marshall, J. (2021). Living life as inquiry – a systemic practice for change agents. Systemic Practice and Action Research, 34(4), 441 - 462. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11213-020-09539-4
Gümüsay, A. A., & Reinecke, J. (2024). Imagining Desirable Futures: A call for prospective theorizing with speculative rigour. Organization Theory, 5(1), 1 - 23. https://doi.org/10.1177/26317877241235939
Marshall, J. (1999). Living life as inquiry. Systemic Practice and Action Research, 12(2), 155 - 171. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022421929640
Reason, P. & Torbert, W.R. (2001). The action turn: Toward a transformational social science. Concepts & Transformation, 6 (1), 1 - 37. doi.org/10.1075/cat.6.1.02rea
Shotter, J. (2010). Situated dialogic action research: Disclosing “beginnings” for innovative change in organizations. Organizational Research Methods, 13(2), 268 - 285.
Torbert, W.R. (1981). Why educational research has been so uneducational: The case for a new mode of social science based on collaborative inquiry. In P. Reason & J. Rowan. Human inquiry: A sourcebook of new paradigm research (pp. 1241 - 152). London: Sage.
Torbert, W. (1991). The power of balance: Transforming self, society, and scientific inquiry, Newbury Park CA: Sage.
Torbert, W. R. (2000). Transforming social science to integrate quantitative, qualitative, and action research. In F. Sherman & W. R. Torbert (Eds.), Transforming social inquiry, transforming social action (pp. 67 - 92). Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Torbert, W.R. (2013). Listening into the Dark: An Essay Testing the Validity and Efficacy of Collaborative Developmental Action Inquiry for Describing and Encouraging Transformations of Self, Society, and Scientific Inquiry. Integral Review Vol. 9, No. 2
Torbert, W. R. (2021). Numbskull in the theatre of inquiry: Transforming self, friends, organizations and social sciences. Waterside Productions.
Torbert, W. R., & Associates. (2004). Action inquiry: The secret of timely and transforming leadership. Berrett-Koehler.
Torbert, W. R., & Taylor, S. S. (2008). Action inquiry: Interweaving multiple qualities of attention for timely action. The SAGE handbook of action research: Participative inquiry and practice.
Van Montfort, D., Coghlan, D., & Zandee, D. (2023). Enabling change through appreciating oscillations between cynical and uplifting conversations. Academy of Management Proceedings, 2023(1), Article 16294. https://doi.org/10.5465/AMPROC.2023.16294abstract