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Regional Roles of Higher Education

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Encyclopedia of International Higher Education Systems and Institutions

Introduction

The existing literature pertaining to the role of higher education (HE) institutions in regional development can be grouped into two main categories, between academic research and policy research. Each of these can be further subdivided into two sorts, giving four types of study: impact studies, looking at the economic contribution accrued to the presence of the university in a given locality; process studies, seeking to explain and understand the microscale processes by which universities create regional benefits; policy research, attempting to enlighten policy-makers in the issues of universities and regional development; and policy development, practical experiments to develop tools and instruments to improve universities’ regional development contributions. Below we review core contributions within each of these categories.

Impact-Based Academic Studies

It is widely acknowledged that the direct/indirect regional impacts of universities are multifaceted (Florax 1992:...

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Pinheiro, R., Benneworth, P. (2018). Regional Roles of Higher Education. In: Encyclopedia of International Higher Education Systems and Institutions. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9553-1_528-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9553-1_528-1

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