How universities can help make ‘place’ matter: Lessons from across the UK

At the recent CiviCon24 National Civic Impact Accelerator, Y-PERN and other partners joined together to host a workshop which explored how universities can help make ‘place’ matter. Andy Mycock , Emily Adams, Jo Hutchings, Sara Hassan and Alison Clarke reflect.

A notable emergent theme in debates about the purpose and contribution of higher education has been a growing resonance of ‘place’ and demand for ‘place-based’ research with communities. This has in part been driven by the now familiar language focusing on spatial and other forms of inequality and evidenced by recent policy initiatives of the outgoing Conservative government, such as the ‘levelling up’ agenda and the shared prosperity fund. This has been allied with a growing focus on the need for the higher education sector to invest in ‘authentic co-creation’ with governmental and non-governmental stakeholders and communities.

At the recent National Civic Impact Accelerator ‘CiviCon24’Swansea University’s Local Challenges Research OfficeCity-REDI (City-Region Economic Development Institute)Insights North East, and Y-PERN (Yorkshire & Humber Policy Engagement & Research Network) joined together to host a workshop which explored how universities can help make ‘place’ matter. The session drew on their diverse experiences in understanding and enhancing relationships between universities, the ‘places’ they reside, and the communities in which their staff and students live and work. Despite their diverse national and regional contexts, several shared themes were immediately apparent, particularly the opportunities and challenges inherent in moving away from traditional top-down approaches to more community-led research and collaborative policymaking.

One issue which resonated in the workshop was how and the extent to which universities understood and engaged with local places and communities. It was noted that the diverse nature and stability of community relationships is one of the most prevalent challenges of place-based research. Research funding strategies and structures, together with other financial factors, often rendered place-based relationships as transactional and extractive. Prioritising university needs had thus cultivated a sector-wide ambivalence toward community engagement, and contributed to an ongoing turbulence across higher education that meant connections to place were unstable and piecemeal.

A clear theme emerged from the workshop that enhanced devolution had proven a catalyst for a renewed commitment to place by universities. Although devolution has evolved at different times and ways across the UK, the emergence of new legislative frameworks, infrastructures, and funding opportunities has impacted positively on the place-based relationships between universities and their communities. Individual and networks of universities have willingly taken on the role of hubs and facilitators in place-based research and community engagement, supporting evidence-based policymaking across an increasingly diverse, multi-level governmental landscape. This has involved working with new sub-state national and regional levels of government in different parts of the UK with diverse policy powers and responsibilities and engaging across a range of spatial policymaking and community geographies.

Participants in the workshop noted that the asymmetric development of devolution across the UK has thus generated important new opportunities for the comparative study of place and the role of higher education in supporting communities and policymakers. Moreover, emergent research findings across existing iterations of devolution have the potential to aid universities and communities navigating devolution for the first time. This was highlighted in the workshop by colleagues based at universities in the East Midlands where devolution has just come on stream, and through the work of Y-PERN which engages with four very different combined authorities across the Yorkshire and Humber region.

This indicates that knowledge exchange across the higher education sector is a key pillar of place-based research, partnerships, and relationships. While partnerships and relationships have always been integral to university strategy, place offers a nucleus for such activity. Devolved contexts stimulate collaboration over competition – encouraging universities to work in partnership for the benefit of their region. For example, as the Higher Education Funding Council Wales (HEFCW) transforms to Medr, universities have been urged to create formalised partnership boards within tertiary education; directives also encourage the inclusion of community partners to maximise regional impact. Likewise, the Universities Policy Engagement Network (UPEN) has established a Nations and Regions working group to bring together universities and their academic and non-academic staff to develop knowledge and understandings of place, while academic policy engagement networks such as City-REDI, Y-PERN, and Insights North-East have established strong informal network links to encourage collaboration.

A place-centric strategy is also understood to have fostered a new approach to more equitable civic engagement. Workshops discussions revealed a shared focus on prioritising meaningful long-term relationships, the importance of understanding the history and geography of a place, knowing how to present and communicate with different communities, and directing university resource in a strategic way to support local challenges. Balancing what the community wants with what universities can realistically provide is thus a delicate task.

The workshop concluded by considering how universities can ensure the sustainability of their place networks beyond a repetitive cycle of time-limited place-based funding calls. Strategic civic engagement should not be bound by research trends and university funding requirements. Participants agreed that key to breaking established patterns which shape the transactional nature of many place-based relationships was a clear emphasis on community-led, partner-focused, civic engagement that is driven by a desire for mutual benefit.

It is clear that place will continue to resonate strongly in shaping the new UK government’s approach to devolution and community engagement. As universities invest more time and resource in understanding their communities to inform policy and research agendas, especially in the context of devolution, the challenge of measuring impact and being strategic in engagement efforts will become more challenging and important. The emerging themes identified at our CiviCon24 workshop are instructive and the rich nature of the discussions by participants evidences the value of a broader comparative study of how devolution is reshaping the place-based agenda. It is critical that UPEN, the National Civic Impact Accelerator (NCIA), the National Coordinating Centre for Public Engagement (NCCPE) and the main higher education research funding council work together to support and connect such conversations to ensure enhance universities can enhance the role of place in all their endeavours.