Universities in external knowledge networks: particular roles for particular universities?

The paper addresses the key issue within the special track “One size does not fit all”: are there distinct ways that different kinds of universities interact with their environments at local, regional and national levels? In this paper, we begin from the critique in the call for papers in this track of what is termed a simplistic model of the universities’ regional enhancement role. The session seeks to explore how universities (or different tertiary level/higher education institutions) relate with other organizations in their environment in particular ways, depending on the particularities of both the regions and the universities