Learning ecosystems for urban transformations? TRANS-LEARN and the role of intermediaries in systemic knowledge practices

Keywords: urban transformations, experimental governance, learning, knowledge practice
Abstract Type: Paper Abstract

Abstract

Even though the idea of learning is central to much work aiming to facilitate urban sustainability transformations, there is a research gap on how such learning actually takes place. What we however do know about learning processes is that they are incredibly complex, and that it is therefore risky to simply assume that learning will take place automatically. In recent years, a large number of urban experiments and small-scale live innovation projects have been performed in cities around the globe. Their purpose has been to enhance our understanding of how a broad urban sustainability transformation might take shape. Underpinning these attempts at achieving concrete alterations of urban structures and behaviors is the idea that they will function as opportunities for learning.
The task of generating and spreading knowledge generated in such projects often rests upon learning intermediaries. These are organizations that work across administrative scales and borders to build networks of learning relations between different types of societal actors. To really understand how learning takes place in these types of contexts and processes, it is therefore crucial to study the practices and ways of organizing that can generate preconditions for an efficient learning process. Consequently, the purpose of the recently started Ecosystems of learning for urban sustainability transformations (TRANS-LEARN) project is to investigate how the ecosystems of learning in sustainable urban development – that is: the dynamic and interdependent learning processes and learning environments – can be enhanced.