Speaker
Description
European University Alliances are increasingly evolving from cooperation platforms into strategic systems that connect education, research, innovation, skills development, and societal engagement across borders. This contribution examines how alliances move beyond project-based collaboration toward more durable forms of institutional transformation through governance structures, coordination mechanisms, and alliance-level enabling capacities.
Using FORTHEM as an illustrative case, the presentation explores how thematic labs, alliance governance architectures, early-stage researcher ecosystems, and regional innovation linkages contribute to the institutionalization of cross-border collaboration between the European Education Area (EEA) and the European Research Area (ERA). The talk particularly focuses on alliances as value-driven knowledge ecosystems operating under conditions of fragmented governance, financial constraints, and increasing expectations regarding resilience, competitiveness, and strategic autonomy. The presentation further discusses emerging challenges such as research assessment reform, professionalization of research management, and the tension between inclusive collaboration and increasingly competitiveness-oriented European funding frameworks. It argues that alliances are becoming implementation environments for European policy ambitions and experimental spaces for new forms of systemic coordination and institutional integration.
| Presenting author | Dr. Nicole Birkle |
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