Conclave in the Tower of Babel: How peers review interdisciplinary research proposals

Peer review is a practice of research assessment where a researcher's work is evaluated by colleagues working in the same field on similar topics. Since interdisciplinary research is a new synthesis of expertise, the problem arises that peers in that sense do not exist. The aim of the paper is to show how under these conditions a specific institutional form of peer review counteracts the additional stress stemming from the interdisciplinarity of grant proposals and the multidisciplinary composition of the panel. The basis is an empirical study of networks of research groups belonging to different specialties. The key features of the procedure are the empowerment of applicants and the enforced interdisciplinary learning of reviewers. The applicability of this procedure appears to be limited to areas where interdisciplinary research is common and where interdisciplinarity is only 'moderate'.