Knowledge That Matters: Identifying Regional Knowledge Assets of the Tampere Region

The existing literature considers knowledge as one of the key drivers of regional development. The idiosyncratic nature of regional knowledge is also acknowledged: each region possesses its unique knowledge assets which serve as the basis of value creation. However, what is currently not well-known is how the region-specific knowledge assets can be identified, for example, in order to manage and develop them. Thus this paper aims first to explore how the relevant knowledge assets can be identified for a given region, and, second, to describe what the context-specific knowledge assets are. These objectives are pursued using a qualitative case approach. As a case region, this study focuses on the Tampere Region in Finland. The study makes a contribution by providing a new insight regarding the contextual identification of regional knowledge assets and by illustrating the key knowledge assets of the case region. These insights are considered valuable for the regional actors responsible for carrying out similar initiatives in their respective regions.     

Advisory Professorship Model as a Tool for Practice-Based Regional University–Industry Cooperation

The growing importance of “practice-based innovation models” has challenged the current consensus on the role of universities as main drivers of regional innovation systems. New models are needed to ensure the efficiency of co-operation between the region and universities. In this article, we present and analyse the effects of one practice-based innovation tool, the advisory professorship model, developed in the Lahti region, Finland. The Lahti region is relatively big by Finnish standards, but has no university of its own, which makes new types of knowledge transfer necessary. The empirical analysis is based on interviews of the companies that participated in the materials technology advisory professorship programme, developed and operated by Tampere University of Technology. In the analysis, we utilize the conceptual framework and analytical matrix developed by Tura et al. [(2008) Breaking inside the black box: Towards a dynamic evaluation framework of regional innovative capability, Science and Public Policy, 35(10), pp. 733–744] in the measuring of regional innovation capability. The study approach is based on regional and industrial viewpoints. In the light of the study, the programme had positive impacts on the innovation capability and innovation processes of companies. The advisory professorship model can be considered a useful practice-based innovation tool for regional university–industry co-operation with some limitations.     

Deliberation in representative institutions: an analytical framework for a systemic approach

This article presents a novel analytical account of the relationship between deliberation and representation by reconstructing the specific institutional logics that guide deliberative action in parliaments. In contrast to the dominant generalised paradigm in empirical deliberation research it develops a contextualised-systemic approach. The article argues that the parliamentary context is characterised by a tension between two equally legitimate institutional logics: a discursive one, institutionalised through parliamentary procedures, and a positional one, constituted by relations of representation. The resulting theoretical model links the specific institutional and situational conditions to different forms and functions of deliberation. Depending on the specific balance between both logics deliberation fulfils functions of either integration or contestation. The model is applied to a comparative analysis of different cases of parliaments demonstrating how this account can advance both the comparative analysis of deliberation in representative institutions and the development of deliberative democracy after the systemic turn.     

Politics of affect in the EU heritage policy discourse: an analysis of promotional videos of sites awarded with the European Heritage Label

European cultural heritage is discussed with affective rhetoric in current European Union (EU) policy discourse. How does affect contribute to the meaning-making of a European cultural heritage and how are the workings of affect used by the EU to promote certain meanings of heritage and effect thereupon? The analysis focuses on recent promotional videos of sites awarded with the European Heritage Label by the EU. In the videos, affective textual, visual, audible, and narrative tropes intertwine with the tropes of EU policy rhetoric, increasing its capacity to impact and ‘move’ the receivers. The ethos of a European cultural heritage in the videos is based on a paradox: the history of the several sites is in various ways intertwined with extreme agony, violence, hatred, oppression, and injustice. However, the stories of the sites in the videos turn their legacy into a positive ethos of conquering these negative extremes and cherishing their positive opposites: freedom, justice, solidarity, and peace. The affectivity of the videos prepares the receivers to adopt their political aim: support for the EU and European integration. The analysis indicates how affect has a key role in producing an impression of the irrefutability and choicelessness of EU politics.     

The temporality of territorial production – the case of Stortorget,Malmö

In recent years, we have seen the development of a more relational approach to territoriality. This perspective, which focuses on events rather than space, also opens up for an elaboration of temporal aspects of territorial production. In this study, I investigate the central urban square, Stortorget, in Malmö, Sweden, in order to develop a discussion of a time–space territorology. In 1978, Korosec-Serfaty performed a thorough study of the square, observing its everyday activities. The present study compares territorial productions at Malmö’s Main Square during 1978 with those of 2013. The results of the study indicate a change of time–space production in which temporary territorial appropriations and tactics tend to become shorter in duration, whereas the number of temporary and large-scale territorial strategies has increased and the role of these become more important. The study also shows how these territorial transformations include changes (in pace, rhythm, temporal salience and scale) that seem to vertically stabilise the territorial structure of the square, and thus decrease both territorial complexity and the possibilities for new publics to evolve.     

Veli Verkko as an Early Criminologist

Today, the Finnish criminologist and sociologist Veli Verkko (1893–1955) is remembered and cited because of ‘Verkko’s laws’, which predict cross-sectional and temporal regularities between homicide rates and patterns. This article describes Verkko’s criminological thought more broadly and situates him in the historical divide between bio-criminology and the rise of sociological environmentalism. In this paradigmatic conflict, Verkko took an unlikely path: while remaining a multiple factor theorist and social environmentalist, he came to see biology as increasingly relevant in the post-war era, at a time when other social scientists were rejecting bio-perspectives. Because of this, he became involved in the controversy over the malleability of human behaviour. Following prior work on institutional influences on the development of human sciences, it is shown that policy demand for a new kind of research influenced the genesis and outcome of this debate. The post-war building of the welfare state promoted research and social engineering activities based on the premise of human malleability. The Verkko case thus suggests how historically changing institutional factors can influence not only research topics but also more fundamental changes in paradigmatic assumptions of research.     

Collaboration for Local Economic Development: Business Networks,Politics and Universities in Two Swedish Cities

In this article we want to show how conceptions about collaboration for local eocnomic development in Sweden are constructed on national and local levels. We also show how these conceptions have been realized in two different company networks; in the city of Östersund (“Odenskog företagsstaden”) and in the city of Karlskrona (“Telecom City”). In politics and research, local collaboration or cluster formation are viewed as important tools and levers for local economic development. However, we argue that the local labour markets and unemployment rates in our case studies do not differ significantly, despite very different strategies for collaboration. Therefore, we suspect that the political focus on collaboration is a way of legitimizing the change in regional policy rather than a delegation of real power to the local level. If this continues, we fear that the current regional policy is reduced to a discourse of popular concepts rather than a real instrument for local economic development.