Universities as change agents for sustainability – framing the role of knowledge transfer and generation in regional development processes

This paper explores opportunities for universities to contribute to local and regional development processes, apart from classical knowledge transfer within education and lifelong learning. In order to draft an analytical framework for the university-society relationship in regional development processes, we introduce three theoretical frameworks: planning, learning, and implementation theory, as well as shift the research perspective from university to regional development processes. The elaborated framework is applied to two case studies in Austria: the Montagsakademie, an initiative of the Karl-Franzens University in Graz, and PlanVision, an energy research project between the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna and the Town of Freistadt. From the analysis can be concluded that knowledge provision is not enough to establish the university as a change agent. In order to reach this effect, “ownership” of knowledge within local and regional communities has to be achieved. This ownership affects the level of values (shared visions and objectives concerning sustainable development) and the level of facts (addressing the skills for implementation and action) and can best be attained through joint knowledge generation. Universities that want to act as change agents have to thoroughly consider collaborative ways of research and education in informal learning environments so that knowledge demand, knowledge transfer and knowledge generation can be negotiated and jointly determined between local and regional societies and universities.