How do we conceptualise the role
of universities and PRIs in a
national system of innovation
where the goal is inclusive and
sustainable development?
Innovation for inclusive and sustainable development:
The southern perspective I
Glenda Kruss and Il-haam Petersen
Indialics conference, Thiruvananthapuram,
India
Social science that makes a difference
17 March 2016
Developmental challenge for universities
and public research institutes
• Structural constraints, global inequalities – but optimism - spaces for
national agency? Where can we intervene?
• Universities and public research institutes: potentially key actors in
national innovation and inclusive development networks
• BUT how do we orient their scientific knowledge and technology to wide/r
socio-economic benefit / social inclusion?
• Universities and PRIs in Southern Africa typically:
• Global science <-> solutions to complex local problems
• Value academic and institutional reputations
• International agencies promote imitation of dominant models =
entrepreneurialism and commercialisation, firm linkages, IPR
• ‘community engagement’ welfare oriented, student ‘service learning’,
research= new low-cost energy/sanitation/water products - but with
no/inadequate diffusion processes
=> How conceptualise their roles in national system of innovation
where goal is inclusive and sustainable development?
Social science that makes a difference
Macro-Economic
Policy
Public
Research
Institutions
Factor
Conditions
Firms & Industry
Structure
For-Profit
Market
Informal Actors &
Informal Economy
Public Goods
Provision
Government
Education
&University
Systems
Supporting
Industries
Legal & Financial
Systems
Social science that makes a difference
Finding new ways to link to
informal actors
• Universities should interact and build linkages with formal and
informal actors, to benefit of for-profit markets and public good
provision
• Multiple roles: strategic balance of financial, intellectual and social
development imperatives in line with national/ organisational/
departmental goals
• Integrated into teaching and learning, research and outreach
• All disciplines: science, business and humanities
• BUT models for linking with informal actors: Unequal knowledge
and power relations? Degree of agency and participation? Capacity
to acquire and use knowledge?
 How do we understand the nature of and build capabilities of
universities and PRIs to interact with informal actors?
 Extend concepts of interactive capabilities, from firms to knowledge
organisations (von Tunzelman 2007, 2010)
Social science that makes a difference
CAPABILITY BUILDING PROCESSES: UNIVERSITIES AND PRIS
Interactive capabilities
Competencies
Embodied/tacit
Skills in specialised areas
Willingness/motivation to interact
Leaderships skills (social skill)
Organisational planning
Disembodied/codified
Capability building mechanisms/strategies
Circumstance
Internal interface
Feedback systems
Incentives for academic
excellence
Functional integration
External interface
Research collaboration- centres
Outreach campuses
Science
shops
Co-operative and service learning
Technology platforms SMMES
Training courses
Social incubators / Agriparks
Organisational structures
Institutional policies (formal)
Diversified funding base
Environmental
turbulence
t
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Social science that makes a difference
Sensing
Learning
Integrating
Coordinating
Dynamic interactive capabilities
Conclusion: Towards alternative models
• Global and national macro-conditions constrain and limit
universities and PRIs
• But such a model can promote capabilities for dynamic
and strategic agency - rather than passive reaction – at
the meso- and micro-levels…
• Grounded in and responding to context-specific
developmental challenges – rather than importation and
mimicry of ‘entrepreneurial’ models
Social science that makes a difference
Thank you
[email protected]
[email protected]
Social science that makes a difference