Continuity was a central factor for the project during the different parts of the serious game. The sessions were held over a period of one-and-a-half years, between April 2012 and October 2013. The long duration of the intervals between sessions was in part necessary for the project to be able to additionally incorporate the federal level. This was relevant for regional stakeholders' decisions, as the federal government sets the overall framework for possible responses at the regional level.4 In order to most realistically simulate regional decision-making, the regional level actors and stakeholders therefore had to interact with the federal level to explore the relationship between both levels, and to develop an exchange between them.

The result is a two-tier serious game as shown in Fig. 10.5.

**Fig. 10.5** The two-tier serious game of eLAN (eLAN 2014, also in Guimarães et al. 2014)

4I.e. The German Renewable Energy Sources Act—*Das Erneuerbare-Energien-Gesetz (EEG)* which sets the frame for electricity to be preferentially produced by regenerative energy sources and refunded by certain mechanisms. For the German federal states, important also for electrical vehicles and transport modes.

#### **10.8 How to Play the** e**LAN Serious Game**

To implement the serious game, a series of moderated workshops was held in which key stakeholders from the case study area were asked to react to scenarios of rising energy prices. They were asked to act according to their best intentions and knowledge as they would in reality, and thus to decide on measures and strategies to counter the negative effects of rising energy prices identified for their municipality or their respective sphere of action.

Several serious game sessions were held during the eLAN project between 2012 and 2013. Decision-makers from different administrative levels reacted to a scenario of constantly high energy prices, which would stress the public purse through costs for providing transport, social services and energy for heating, street lights, etc. If energy prices consistently rose and were not a peak event that ceased after a few days or weeks (like in the 1970s or in 2008), stakeholders would be more likely to be forced to take action to counter the noticeable effects of increased fuel and heating costs. One possible option was to directly subsidise fuel costs for consumers. Another option would be a systemic option for hardship cases to improve their financial situation, strained by rising energy prices. Those were two possible strategies decision-makers might decide on. These and other possible answers were anticipated by the project as possible outcomes of the serious game.

For the project's starting scenario, "2015", a price of USD 200 per barrel of crude oil (Brent) was set. This was calculated to result in a pump price of EUR 2.20 per litre. The average additional cost per household paid for energy (heating, transport and electricity) in the scenario was subsequently calculated to be EUR 130 per month compared to prices in 2010. For the later scenario, "2025", the prices were set at USD 400 per barrel of crude oil (Brent), which amounted to an additional EUR 340 compared to 2010 prices.

To formulate decisions, measures, etc., decision-makers were provided with LuT model results translated into figures, tables and maps, as well as newspaper articles. These materials consisted of an easily understandable multifaceted set of information, which gave tangible meaning to abstract model numbers. The aim behind providing and distributing information in this way was to simulate the real conditions in which policymaking occurs as closely as possible.

Suggested policies by decision-makers were constrained by their current powers within the German federal system as well as by current municipal budgetary restrictions. The restrictions were defined to be as realistic as possible to prevent participants from pursuing "unrealistic" responses, e.g. in the sense of spending more on measures than they would be able to in reality. The project also attempted to prevent the inclusion of more measures or ideas in their policy portfolio than they would if the scenario was true.

The outcomes of the sessions were then quantified, translated into parameters for the LuT model and fed back into it. For a more detailed explanation of the serious game design, see Gertz et al. (2015).

During the first session in the Eastern Corridor, the participating decision-makers were presented with the results generated from the integrated land use and transport model as a first step, which was intended to aid them in relating to the scenario on a more personal basis. Through (custom-produced) newspaper articles, they got an impression of how rising energy prices might influence daily life. A report presenting statistics relating to the development scenario—a regional monitor—presented them with key facts and figures in a familiar format to relate to the scenario on a more professional and planning-oriented level. In the second step, the decision-makers identified likely effects on their respective municipality, and were then asked to devise actions and measures to counter the (adverse) consequences of rising energy prices.

On the regional level, participating decision-makers were split into two groups according to their regional affiliation or corridor. One group represented the Eastern Corridor; the other the Western Corridor. The project took different methodological approaches to each region in the serious game, varying in the number of sessions and therefore also in the depth of analysis of the effects for each participating municipality. This paper concentrates on explanations about the serious game within the "East" group, which had more sessions and a longer and therefore deeper phase of analysis. This gave participants more time to analyse the effects of rising energy prices on their own municipality and identify the resulting areas in which there would be a need to act. In the Western Corridor, the first phase of identifying such areas as well as the depth of analysis and time for developing appropriate policies was shorter. The results from both corridors are summarised in the following section.

#### **10.9 The Resulting Policy Agenda**

After two iterative cycles of the serious game, each decision-maker came up with proposals on how to minimise the negative effects of rising energy prices by 2030. The actions and policies developed by each decision-maker were clustered and labelled according to the general direction the measures implied. Depending on the municipal classification (e.g. small town with a rural context or larger city) for which each decision-maker acted, there was no consensus among stakeholders about the general direction that the proposed measures took, and in some cases they were even contradictory. But in some areas, they also complemented each other. An overview of the direction of measures and strategies the municipal representatives came up with is given in Table 10.1.

When taking a closer look at the various measures that decision-makers chose, it is remarkable that they largely come from five policy fields:

**Table 10.1** Policy measures suggested by decision-makers within the eLAN serious game

**Table 10.1** (continued)

**Table 10.1** (continued)

Interestingly, none of the participants suggested that subsidising energy costs directly should be part of their respective strategies or policies.

The majority of the measures suggested by decision-makers belonged to either the housing or transport field. One reason is certainly that decision-makers at all municipal levels believe the housing sector to have great potential for saving energy, e.g. by renovating existing buildings to save energy, and/or by setting higher energy standards for new buildings. The large number of measures suggested in the field of mobility is mainly caused by the assumption that travel as such should still be possible for their citizens or residents, but perhaps by a different mode of transport than before—such as switching from, e.g. car to public transport. Many measures tended to improve public transport services or promote a switch of transport modes. Where travelling by car is the only viable option, participants mentioned ridesharing programmes or related ideas as ways forward. The overall aim is to keep the level of mobility for their residents at least constant, or improve the existing options of transport means for necessary trips.

The results of the eLAN model reveal that the current social disparities within the Hamburg Metropolitan Region will deepen in line with rising energy prices. This result is in part a consequence of a higher car dependency in rural areas and a reasonably well developed mass public transport system in urbanised areas. Not only are different regions differently affected by rising energy prices, but different types of municipalities also experience different effects. Regional centres will face an overheating housing market, as increasing energy prices create additional demand along with the noticeable trend of reurbanisation. One consequence of this development will be that existing mass transport infrastructure will experience increased demand along the main axes and at the main connecting nodes.

At the other end of the scale, rural areas will struggle to compensate for their car dependency by using various strategies to offer other benefits. Developing additional independent structures for energy production or even attracting more jobs are some of the measures municipalities are looking for, depending on their own requirements and capacities.

The effects of increasing energy prices simulated for distances travelled in eLAN show that while the City of Hamburg will experience an increase in traffic, the average distance travelled per day and per person in rural and low-income municipalities will drop by approximately 20 km in comparison to 2010. This sharp reduction in distances travelled affects whole regions, such as Harburg, Storman and Segeberg. Interestingly, inhabitants of some municipalities (mostly in the east) would be less affected or would even drive more than in the reference year. This would occur due to a lack of employment, because high energy prices (among other factors) help to contribute to turning part-time or small-income jobs unprofitable, if commuting costs consume a large fraction of that income. Coupled with the relatively low overall income levels in these areas already, these effects would deepen social inequities in the region.

The results indicate that it is not possible for all municipalities to compensate for the effects of rising energy prices in full. Moreover, some effects might cause already existing trends (demographic change, migration trends, etc.) to increase or to progress at a faster pace.

#### **10.10 Future Options for Using New Modes of Integration**

The participants agreed that the biggest value of the project came from the opportunity to discuss the effects of rising energy costs and possible responses in an unusual setting and with an unprecedented combination of decision-makers. They stated that the views from all regional classifications and different federal bodies enabled them to investigate the problem from multiple angles, and that they rarely had the opportunity to meet in such constellations in their professional setting or field of responsibility.

They also considered the presentation of their strategies incorporated into a model to be valuable, because it allowed them to gain an overview of possible developments and effects of policies, even when there was no numeric output to quantify the effects of individual policies or measures.

The serious game created an interface in which the decision-makers were able to freely discuss a complex problem with other stakeholders that was not (yet) on the agenda but deemed very important. The value added by the serious game to the discussion about new ways for the co-design and co-production of knowledge for land use governance can be seen as an approach for taking a broader view on a complex subject. Serious games can be used as a tool to come to better informed conclusions; the idea of co-design in the context of land use as a scarce resource and in meeting sustainability goals was especially fruitful. This was true not only within various administrative levels—to broaden the view on one specific problem—but also in a context, e.g. with local stakeholders, to use serious games as a participatory co-creation tool. As an example to actively involve additionally practical experience for a broader view on a complex subject, serious games can involve farmers in the process of agroecosystem design and identify factors and patterns of local-level decision-making to openly discuss and share their ideas (Speelman et al. 2014).

This is just one option how serious games can add value to sustainable land management due to their discursive design and the wide selection of participants. The serious game enabled the participants as a group to come to a better understanding of the problem by combining views from different (occupational) backgrounds, public institutions, panels, or other more formalised structures that would not meet in the traditional course of planning and policy; this thus enhanced the formal process at an early stage.

A broader understanding of the problem via serious games does not necessarily lead to a "better" solution for a problem in the sense of increased efficiency, but it may enable decision-makers to consider more facets and thus raise the group's level of knowledge through the inherently communicative design of a serious game.

To determine all important aspects of a complex problem, planning in such a broad context is necessary, but it depends on many variables. Exploring such problems with tools such as serious games, which are not standard procedure or formalised, can add value to the whole process. Nevertheless, the non-standard design requires individual commitment. To embed such commitment into more formal structures or procedures might in some sense be counterproductive, but should be understood as acknowledged evidence for the usefulness of serious games as a tool for improving administrative and political processes.

The complex context of sustainable land use also lends itself to serious games. Many serious games utilise dynamic computer-based elements to create scenarios for the participants or to demonstrate decision results or the outcomes of the session. Participants of eLAN stressed the need for more exchange about complex problems. Another example of exchange and format on complex land use problems was LandYOUs, where participants explored dimensions of sustainability with respect to economic, social and environmental conditions, while being continuously threatened by global trade fluctuations and limited resources as described in Schulze et al. (2015) and Seppelt et al. (2014).

Different formats for exchange and exploration besides the standard methods and boards of professional planning must still be discussed further to facilitate crossborder solutions adequate for the problem. The developments of the past ten years have shown that serious games are increasingly seen as collaborative tools to enhance planning decisions and sustainable land management. Research by den Haan and van der Voort (2018) has offered a glimpse of the possibilities, citing examples of more than 40 serious games around the world in the field of sustainable land management.

These results reinforce the idea of serious games as a platform for this necessary and desired exchange as part of the preparatory process for policymaking. This is especially the case in the complex fields of planning and policymaking, where planners and politicians need a combination of the opportunities to process complex information and respond to the possible effects of their decisions. In such circumstances, an integrated computer-supported serious game like eLAN can be a valuable tool of support at all levels of government and administration.

#### **References**

Newman, N. (2008). The high price of oil. *Engineering & Technology, 3*(8), 46–49.

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# **Chapter 11 Real-World Laboratories Initiated by Practitioner Stakeholders for Sustainable Land Management—Characteristics and Challenges Using the Example of Energieavantgarde Anhalt**

#### **Helga Kanning, Bianca Richter-Harm, Babette Scurrell, and Özgür Yildiz**

**Abstract** Real-world laboratories have gained substantially in importance as a format in sustainability and transformation research in recent years in Germany. This increase in significance is associated with the expectation of fostering and experimentally investigating transformations towards sustainability under real-world conditions in a bid to gain knowledge of their dynamics, to identify characteristics of successful transformation processes, and to be able to transfer this knowledge to other cases. Real-world laboratories are usually managed by a scientific partner, enabling use to be made of established procedures and methods in areas such as knowledge integration. Where responsibility for coordinating real-world laboratories lies with practitioner stakeholders, there is promising potential for their deployment. However, it also gives rise to situations, processes and challenges that are new to all parties involved and that have yet to be explored. In principle, experimental approaches that are characteristic of real-world laboratories are not new in the field of sustainable land management and spatial development. However, they are not traditionally alluded to as the real-world

H. Kanning (B) · B. Richter-Harm

Sustainify GmbH, Institut für Nachhaltige Forschung, Bildung, Innovation, Große Düwelstr. 28, 30171 Hannover, Germany e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
B. Richter-Harm e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
B. Scurrell Schefferweg 2, 12249 Berlin, Germany e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
Ö. Yildiz

Department of Environmental Economics, Technische Universität Berlin, Straße des 17. Juni, 10623 Berlin, Germany e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
For reasons of readability and simplicity, no use is made of the masculine and feminine form when referring to people or job titles in this publication. However, all genders are implied at all times.

laboratory format. The two desiderata above provide the starting point for the present article. The aim of this article is to classify and reflect on the possibilities generated by real-world laboratories that have been initiated by practitioner stakeholders. A prime example of such real-world laboratories are those developed by Energieavantgarde Anhalt. This registered association wishes to contribute to sustainable land management in the context of the energy transition in rural areas, featuring small and medium-sized towns. A comparative analysis of these real-world laboratories is conducted using core characteristics from the scientific debate on real-world laboratories. As a result, the insight gained from this analysis can be used for future development and research.

**Keywords** Regional energy transition · Real-world laboratories as a whole, within a project · Practitioner stakeholder's initiative · Participation · Co-design, Co-production

#### **11.1 Introduction**

Real-world laboratories are gaining importance in the field of sustainable land management and spatial development (see, for example, Augenstein et al. 2016; Hahne and Kegler 2016). In Germany, the discussion on these innovative formats was primarily triggered by the flagship report by the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU) "World in Transition: A Social Contract for Sustainability" (WBGU 2011). In its report, WBGU recommends a new kind of interaction between politics, society, science and the economy (ibid.: 26). In this context, transdisciplinary and transformative sustainability research is encouraged (Schneidewind and Singer-Brodowski 2013: 2015) and, in particular, the format of real-world laboratories promoted (Schneidewind 2014).

The popularity of real-world laboratories has increased dramatically recently in Germany, due not least to the initiation of several support programmes at the federal and state level.1 As such, both the variety of publications and publication density are developing dynamically and at a disproportionately high rate, as pointed out clearly in the analysis by Schäpke et al. (2018a). At the same time, a debate has emerged that is controversial to some extent. While some see little new in the real-world laboratory format, others pin their hopes on the (potentially) innovative power of real-world laboratories (Beecroft and Parodi 2016: 4). In other words, the debate on real-world laboratories and the potential they have for social transformations and

1The state government of Baden-Württemberg in particular was quick to embrace the WBGU recommendations, establishing a "Science for Sustainability" group of experts (MWK 2013) and initiating two support programmes for real-world laboratories (BaWü Labs); for an overview, see: https://mwk.baden-wuerttemberg.de/de/forschung/forschungspolitik/wissenschaftfuer-nachhaltigkeit/reallabore/ (last accessed on 16 July 2019). The Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) also promotes real-world laboratories, for example in the context of the "City of the Future" funding initiative (Schmidt 2017), addressing not only universities in the process, but also communities or municipalities as practitioner stakeholders.

for transformation research has only just begun.2 Real-world laboratories are "in their infancy" (Beecroft and Parodi 2016: 4), and a detailed methodological and theoretical concept has yet to be developed (Grunwald 2016: 204f). Although it can be assumed that real-world laboratories initiated by practitioner stakeholders have high deployment potential on account of the practical approach they take, they have attracted little attention in the scientific debate to date (Engels and Rogge 2018; Menny et al. 2018).

Real-world experiments are generally considered to be the core of the real-world laboratory approach (Schäpke et al. 2017: 3). This idea is not new in the field of sustainable land management. In fact, the approach of experimentally investigating social change processes at the urban level goes back to the sociological Chicago School of the 1920s (Gross et al. 2005: 65ff; Schneidewind 2014: 3). In land management, for example, there are many projects and model projects of an experimental nature that are not, however, termed real-world laboratories. Examples include the International Building Exhibitions (IBA), state and national flower shows, the regional structural aid measures in North Rhine-Westphalia called the REGIONALE, and various regional development processes in the context of European regional assistance (see De Flander et al. 2014: 285; Hohn et al. 2014). As yet, the experience gained in these measures is largely detached from the real-world laboratory debate, meaning that a great deal of research is needed to bring together these aspects (De Flander et al. 2014: 285).

These two desiderata provide the starting point for the present article. The objective is to integrate into the scientific debate real-world laboratories that have been initiated and coordinated by practitioner stakeholders for the purpose of sustainable land management, and to reflect on the possibilities and limitations of those approaches. In the process, questions that have not been addressed in the scientific discussion to date are of importance: What challenges arise when real-world laboratories are initiated by practitioner stakeholders? Are those challenges similar to those arising in real-world laboratories designed by scientists? How do they differ? What opportunities do they offer, and what added value can be expected from the real-world laboratory format? To answer these questions, Sect. 11.2 provides an account of the real-world laboratories initiated by the Energieavantgarde Anhalt (EAA) association, which include the urban laboratories undertaken within the joint research project "The re-productive town"3 funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). The core characteristics of real-world laboratories are then identified from the scientific literature. These characteristics provide the theoretical basis for discussing the special features of real-world laboratories that have been initiated by practitioner stakeholders (Sect. 11.3). This discussion is based not

2Concerning classification in transdisciplinary research and transformation research, see, e.g. Wittmayer and Hölscher (2016), Rogga et al. (2018).

3The project entitled "The re-productive town. Changing towns for achieving the energy and sustainability transition" [original in German: Die re-produktive Stadt. Die Stadt verändern, um die Energieund Nachhaltigkeitswende zu schaffen] receives BMBF funding under the FONA/Social-Ecological Research: "Sustainable Transformation of Urban Areas" funding line from August 2016 to July 2019; see https://re-produktive-stadt.energieavantgarde.de.

only on the experience gained from the BMBF-funded project "The re-productive town", but also on insights from three workshops held with EAA members and other interested participants (business representatives, especially from the utilities sector; representatives from local government and politics and from science) in 2017. The article concludes with a critical analysis and an outlook for future developments (Sect. 11.4).

## **11.2 Real-World Laboratories Initiated by the Practitioner Stakeholder Energieavantgarde Anhalt e.V.**

Energieavantgarde Anhalt (EAA) is an association that acts as a network of stakeholders comprising civil activists, municipalities and rural districts, companies and other institutions in the Anhalt-Bitterfeld-Wittenberg region. This network is committed to accelerate the energy transition in the region in cooperation with national and European partners. The approach was developed in the context of the profound, multiple socio-economic transformation processes that pose huge challenges to towns and regions, such as the closure of businesses and the loss of livelihoods, demographic change, and the energy transition. The direct impact of these processes is very much apparent in the Anhalt-Bitterfeld-Wittenberg region: high cost pressure relating to infrastructure, a sharp fall in property prices, the demolition of entire neighbourhoods. A wide range of technical, economic and socio-cultural innovations are needed to meet the challenges associated with these developments in this region dominated by lignite mining and the chemical industry. These innovations radically change land uses, creating new decentralised, interconnected and energy systems based on renewables, as well as new urban-rural relations. In the process, EAA places particular emphasis on the regionalisation of energy production and energy use and on sector coupling. To achieve this, developments in the area of prosumer models and demand-side management measures should encourage not only resource efficiency, but also system-supporting, flexible energy consumption behaviour, and enable as many citizens as possible to participate in the regional energy transition through regional added value and democratic processes.

Since there is no ready guidance on how to meet these challenges and since a wide range of individual issues need to be resolved, the association calls this largescale regional experiment the "*Anhalt Real-World Laboratory*" (www.energieavant garde.de). In this laboratory, partners engaged as practitioners in the region and scientists join forces to design a variety of sub-laboratories and experimental setups. With this in mind, the association brings together within its framework not only local authorities, public utility companies and technology companies from the renewables sector, but also civil society interest groups. The projects in the region initiated by EAA are generally based on the experience and issues raised by association members within their everyday operations and on collaboration with research institutions in other projects. In their role as project initiators and project coordinators in the region, members of the association explicitly represent the interests of the association and of the regional stakeholders it represents. As a result, the focus is on searching for workable approaches for promoting sustainable development by using renewable energies and achieving high resource efficiency. Considering contributions from the current scientific real-world laboratory debate, this regional institution could also be characterised as a "real-world laboratory as a whole" [own translation] (Beecroft et al. 2018: 80) where various transdisciplinary sustainability projects are implemented.

The joint research project entitled "The re-productive town", which has received BMBF funding for three years, is one of the outcomes of EAA's activities in the Anhalt region. Initiated by EAA, the research alliance comprises EAA and Bitterfeld-Wolfen Town Council as its practice partners, and Brandenburg University of Technology (BTU) Cottbus-Senftenberg/Chair of Urban Technical Infrastructure, the Fraunhofer Institute for Microstructure of Materials and Systems (IMWS) and inter 3 Institute for Resource Management as its science partners. The project is accompanied scientifically by sustainify Institut für nachhaltige Forschung, Bildung, Innovation. In the research project, the town of Bitterfeld-Wolfen is taken as an example of the urban planning challenges associated with transformation. This town seems to be particularly suited to develop and test new approaches for social-ecological urban development. The starting point of the project is the energy sector, from which inroads are made into agriculture and forestry, architecture and building services, industry and finance, citizenry, the urban economy and the urban landscape. Possibilities are systematically sought to consider unexploited resources such as brownfield sites, sun, wind and green waste as well as secondary resources such as waste heat and refuse as a starting point for something new. These innovations are then reutilised for the benefit of the town and its inhabitants or the processes that generate them are directly changed. Conceptually, the approach refers back to the concept of (re)productivity proposed by Biesecker and Hofmeister (2006). According to this concept, (urban) production and consumption processes must be designed in such a way that the town maintains or even improves its material/energy and economic/social reproductive capability in order to remain sustainable or to ensure its long-term survival. The aim is to use the systematic improvement of the material/energy and economic/social reproductive capability of Bitterfeld-Wolfen Town to develop a blueprint for a possible transformation path for a new, yet very common type of town as a result of territorial reforms: an extensive, medium-sized, polycentric town that can be expected to offer new starting points for energy and sustainability transition and, as a result, new townscapes and urban landscapes.

*Urban laboratories* are a core format. *Urban laboratories* are site-specific participatory and communication platforms that map ongoing local transformation processes and enable broad participation. They provide the experimental basis for developing, negotiating and implementing into urban design solutions for the use of secondary resources in urban spaces in cooperation with the population, companies and the administration. This is undertaken in work phases of living labs or real-world laboratories such as co-design, co-creation, co-exploration, coexperimentation/testing and co-evaluation steps. More specifically, four *urban laboratories* representing neighbourhoods typical of medium-sized towns were selected in consideration of characteristics such as resource potentials and stakeholder constellations. These neighbourhoods are

#### **11.3 A Comparison of Core Characteristics**

As outlined in the introduction, there is as yet no uniform theoretical and detailed methodological concept of real-world laboratories (Grunwald 2016: 204f), and therefore no uniform definition either. However, several scientific institutions are currently performing further groundwork, especially also in the context of research in support of the real-world laboratories (BaWü Labs) funded in Baden-Württemberg.4 On the international arena, there are also a multitude of other approaches that are similar to the real-world laboratory format or that were used as its basis. These include living labs, sustainable living labs and urban transition/living labs (for a comparative overview, see Schäpke et al. 2017: 28ff; Schäpke et al. 2018b). Furthermore, an almost inflationary (and simultaneously unspecific) use is currently being made of the term "lab" in other fields.

According to a definition originally introduced by Schneidewind (2014), a realworld laboratory generally describes "… a societal context in which researchers carry out interventions in the sense of 'real-life experiments' in order to learn about social dynamics and processes" [own translation] (Schneidewind 2014: 3). Real-life experiments are considered to be the core of the real-world laboratory approach (Schäpke et al. 2017: 3 with reference to WBGU 2014, 2016; Schneidewind 2014; De Flander et al. 2014; MWK 2013; Wagner and Grunwald 2015). The idea is to transfer the term "laboratory", as used in the natural sciences context, to the analysis of social and

4These include, in particular, the Wuppertal Institute (WI), the Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis (ITAS) at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), the Institute for Social-Ecological Research (ISOE), as well as Leuphana University and the University of Basel, especially in the context of research in support of BaWü Labs. BaWü Labs are supported by two teams of researchers: (1) the "ForReal" team (WI, ISOE, Leuphana University), (2) BF-Uni Basel (University of Basel).

political processes in concrete social contexts (Schäpke et al. 2017: 4). According to the definition coined by Gross et al. (2005), a hybrid form of the experiment is associated with this term, ranging between the production and application of knowledge and situation-specific and controlled boundary conditions (Schneidewind 2014: 2). Conceptually, real-world laboratories therefore build on the 'experimental turn' in the social, economic and sustainability sciences, and are similar to other transdisciplinary and participatory research approaches such as transdisciplinary case studies, participatory action research, fieldwork, intervention research or transition research (Schäpke et al. 2017: 4, referring in each case to prominent representatives of the approaches named).

In the scientific landscape, the concept of the real-world laboratory is therefore easily expandable and currently formative. In practice, however, the term is rejected by some because it evokes associations that experiments are being performed on the participants (Grießhammer and Brohmann 2015: 22). The term "urban laboratory" proved to be useful for work in the "The re-productive town" project. This is because the term is used in the field of urban development, albeit with diverse and different meanings, such as for educational institutions with an experimental laboratory character.

In order to shed light on what characterises real-world laboratories that have been initiated and largely shaped by practitioner stakeholders, we refer below to the core characteristics listed by Parodi et al. (2016): research orientation, normativity, transdisciplinarity, transformativity, civil society orientation/participation, long-term nature and laboratory character (see Table 11.1). These core characteristics largely correspond to or overlap with characterisations proposed by other authors such as WBGU (2016), Schäpke et al. (2017), Defila and Di Giulio (2018a). We add another core feature—continuous processes of reflection and learning with regard to one's own research practice and social effect; these characterise the research process (e.g. Schäpke et al. 2018b; Schneidewind and Singer-Brodowski 2015).

Based on these core characteristics, an outline is given below of how real-world laboratories initiated and coordinated by EAA can be characterised, whether and how they differ from those real-world laboratories that are initiated and coordinated by stakeholders from science, whether they face challenges and, if so, what those challenges are. The definition of the relevant core characteristics is given in Table 11.1.

#### *11.3.1 Regarding Research Orientation*

In the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory* 'as a whole', the EAA association offers interested researchers the region's problems concerning energy design, energy policy and energy management, some of which have already been formulated and structured; its contacts with regional practitioner stakeholders; and its expertise in the development of a sustainable regional energy system for transdisciplinary research. In this sense, EAA serves as an institution for sustainability and transformation research; application-oriented research is explicitly mentioned in the association's statutory objectives. However, whether or to what extent these institutions for real-world laboratories must always have a scientific character is not deemed absolutely necessary in the previous discussion. Instead, the association focuses primarily on practical orientation and on the search for practicable approaches towards sustainable development in its areas of interest; in the process, analytical work and the consideration of internal scientific interests are accepted as prerequisites for joint research and

**Table 11.1** A comparison of the core characteristics and real-world laboratories undertaken by Energieavantgarde Anhalt (authors' compilation)

**Table 11.1** (continued)

1Own translation of Parodi et al. (2016: 16) 2Own translation of Parodi et al. (2016: 16f) 3Own addition to description of characteristics

4Own addition based on Schäpke et al. (2017: 5), Schneidewind and Singer-Brodowski (2015)

development activities. This principle of strong practical orientation can be adapted accordingly to current circumstances and needs at the specific project level.

One example are the *urban laboratories* in the BMBF joint research project entitled "The re-productive town"; these feature an explicit research orientation. The research questions were defined jointly by the scientific partners and the practice partners (co-design); they are accessible for scientific analysis and for practical changes for transformation towards sustainability.

#### *11.3.2 Regarding Normativity*

The normative orientation towards sustainability is one of the association's implicit statutory objectives and, as such, of the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory*. This orientation is specified in the association's statutes on objectives such as to contribute to environmental protection and climate action, and the objective to conserve the natural basis of life.

In *urban laboratories*, the normative assumptions, principles and objectives regarding the reference to the concept of re-productivity by Biesecker and Hofmeister (2006) are made explicit. In this context, the following insight was gained from ongoing work: scientific partners proceed in accordance with elaborated sustainability concepts in real-world laboratories, and it would be helpful for companies, civil society organisations, other institutions and local authorities to use or develop concrete tools in the practical implementation of real-world laboratories. Examples that would make the integrative concept of sustainability tangible for practitioners in the process include environmental protection concepts, corporate social responsibility standards, a local climate action plan, the European Energy Award and other quality management systems. It may also be helpful in this context to adapt for practical use scientific-theoretical sustainability approaches such as the concept of re-productivity in an intermediate step, and to prepare such approaches for practical implementation in the real world (Yildiz et al. 2012).

#### *11.3.3 Regarding Transformativity*

In the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory*, the EAA association focuses primarily on the shaping of society in terms of the energy transition, mainly by way of local experimental contributions. To do this, EAA draws on findings resulting from sustainability research. The work of EEA backs two aspects of real-world laboratories: first, the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory* sees itself as an element of various niche experiments embedded in structuring processes somewhere between the niche level and the regime level. Second, in line with its objective, the work performed by the association should help further develop transformative sciences by portraying and investigating the abstract format of transformation in the real-world laboratory as a physical environment.

Owing to their origins, *urban laboratories* are likewise primarily practiceoriented. Potential changes in the practices of resource utilisation by municipal stakeholders play a key role in the selection of neighbourhoods, and therefore also in the constitution of the problem, the institutions and people involved, and the methods and intensity of participation. This framework also yields a wide range of options for sustainability research and scientific evidence (e.g. the methodological operationalisation of the characteristics of re-productivity in criteria for assessing technical and socio-economic solutions) (Schön et al. 2013).

The strong practical orientation in the EAA real-world laboratories necessitates a careful reflection and evaluation of the approaches taken so as to be able to make statements on the effect of interventions and on the course of transformation processes in real-world laboratories. The small scale and reach of the measures that can be implemented concerning sustainable urban development generally make it difficult to formulate transferable results, which is currently being hotly discussed as a general phenomenon of real-world laboratories.5 One cannot help but suspect that a specific contribution to resource efficiency or a viable use of renewable energies in a certain neighbourhood arises more by accident than by design due to a certain constellation of problems and stakeholders. It is then impossible to repeat such a success at other locations. The result is that strong practical orientation represents a restriction, especially for scientific partners. Then again, precisely these small-scale changes can occur and be documented in the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory*. These are the small steps that represent the details of social transformation, which is ultimately of greater significance from a practical point of view.

#### *11.3.4 Regarding Civil Society Orientation, Participation*

This characteristic exhibits the biggest difference between the state of the scientific discussion and the approaches taken by the EAA real-world laboratories. The drive to initiate the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory* came from civil society, which involved scientists in the project as strong partners. The initiative for the BMBF joint research project and its *urban laboratories* also came from EAA. As such, the direction of activity is opposite to the characteristic portrayed in the literature. The idea for a scientifically supported, experimental transformation of the regional energy system arose from the realisation that the special constellation of stakeholders seeking change and the decisive issue of regional energy supply involving the broader shaping and economic participation of the population became apparent as an opportunity for innovative action. Although science, lobby institutions and financial backers were then involved in the subsequent establishment of the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory* at the

5Concerning this, see also, e.g. Krohn et al. (2017) and www.td-academy.de (last accessed on 16 July 2019).

very beginning, the format can be described as a laboratory initiated by practitioner stakeholders, because:

Against this backdrop, an important finding that is a compelling case for the establishment and long-term operation of real-world laboratories by practitioner stakeholders is the fact that it takes a long time to establish successful participatory constellations. This longer-term option is missing in *urban laboratories* (see the long-term nature criterion). To achieve effective cooperation in the transformation of society, all stakeholders must also act proactively so as to position their issues and other concerns. After all, a form of cooperation that always expects the drive and organisation to come from the same partner will soon show signs of fatigue. It is clear that the involvement of local stakeholders remains a challenge, even if the real-world laboratory is initiated by practice partners. Even if a region has activists who are interested in transformative research, this does not mean that all of the stakeholders needed to tackle a specific issue are willing to get involved. At best, the initiating practice partner will be powerful, influential and well networked, enabling it to organise the constructive participation of the necessary stakeholders.

## *11.3.5 Regarding the Long-Term Nature and Laboratory Character*

The *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory* is designed for the long term. The association seeks to establish transdisciplinary infrastructure with adequate physical and personnel resources (criterion laboratory character) to be able to ensure the best, most stable possible conditions for experimental research and observation in complex real-world contexts (see Parodi et al. 2016). In contrast, *urban laboratories* are based on a three-year time frame and are project-related, despite ideally desiring their longer-term and autonomous establishment.

The availability of sufficient resources is a prerequisite for this. However, the non-profit association has very limited resources. One possibility would be to raise funds by providing services, but this would imply a change of role to that of a market economy stakeholder like an energy agency, planning office or consulting agency. However, if EAA represents its own business interests, it runs the risk of losing credibility with regard to the handling of sensitive data. This is likely to affect the trust required to acquire regional cooperation partners for transformative research, and the quasi-public role of mediating between possibly competing partners could only be played to a very limited extent in the best case (Yildiz and Schön 2014).

As a result, in order to maintain transdisciplinary infrastructure in the long run, other ways of obtaining sustainable funding must be found by EAA in this specific case and by other practitioner stakeholders seeking to establish real-world laboratories. One option could be a system of mixed financing, comprising continuous funding from state and local resources, together with the acquisition of external funding for research to ensure the independence and impartiality of the real-world laboratory. In this way, the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory* could be stabilised as an independent sponsor of transformative research and regional development, akin to an (economic) development agency. With regard to ensuring sustainable infrastructure, the challenge is principally to ensure continuous work processes. This is not possible in the case of project funding alone. After all, funding shortfalls will inevitably occur between a funding project and the next funding projects, ideally following straight on from the first. Unlike research institutions, which are equipped with basic funding, practitioner stakeholders are particularly affected by such shortfalls. Moreover, subsequent funding is uncertain, and there are limitations to the capability of the content to tie in with previous funding, due to the fact that support programmes are usually themed. Besides the (political) will to establish experimental spaces and to actively co-create them, the funding issue therefore becomes a key issue for the establishment of longer-term, viable infrastructures for real-world laboratories (see Kanning and Scurrell 2018).

## *11.3.6 Regarding Continuous Processes of Reflection and Learning*

To assess the processes of reflection and learning, emphasis is placed below on the level of interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary cooperation (Singer-Brodowski et al. 2018) as well as the associated role of accompanying research (Defila and Di Giulio 2018b).

When it established the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory*, EAA already made provision for accompanying research. The discussions about the topic proved to be difficult. This was because partners with previous experience in transdisciplinary research expected to be closely involved in the real-world laboratory, while the majority of partners assumed that traditional observational research would be conducted. The accompanying research was thus established in the context of a Ph.D. project at the Berlin Social Science Center (WZB), financed by the real-world laboratory. In the light of the findings on relations between researchers, accompanying researchers and financial backers presented in the meantime by Defila and Di Giulio (2018b), it is now possible to make a more detailed assessment of this issue.

The existing accompanying research in the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory* is indeed geared towards producing knowledge on the processes that take place in the real-world laboratory. According to Defila and Di Giulio (2018b), however, the relation to individual projects in the real-world laboratory can be described as a relation to the "object of research" that is characterised by dependence and an unequal distribution of power. This relation to the object is very much apparent in the real-world laboratory. The strong substantive involvement of the association's main financial backer gives it access to information about the individual projects. What is more, in addition to the geographical proximity of the accompanying research to the association's sponsors (both from outside the region), the financial backer's interests are close to those of the research institution, namely the effectiveness of energy policy and the national recognition of achievements. As such, the tensions described by Defila and Di Giulio (2018b) do not occur in the sponsor's relation to accompanying research, but there are tensions in both their relations to regional stakeholders. There is a realisation that the establishment of the *Anhalt Real-World Laboratory*, driven by practitioner stakeholders, could well have benefited from accompaniment experienced in transdisciplinary research in order to cope with integrating the different bases and forms of knowledge.

In the BMBF research project entitled "The re-productive town", within which *urban laboratories* are initiated and developed, this was achieved by contracting out support in the experience process, the knowledge process and the process of transferring results—although it was not possible to describe this that clearly at the time of the application. The knowledge of experienced transdisciplinary researchers is necessary to integrate knowledge bases from practice and science; to produce transferable knowledge; and, not least, to ensure the continuous self-reflection of different, sometimes changing roles in the transdisciplinary learning process. Ideally, such knowledge should be involved as early as at the stage of conceptually designing real-world laboratories. In this case, scientific accompaniment by a neutral moderator such as sustainify GmbH proved to be successful in the joint research project, ensuring the integration of different bases and forms of knowledge as well as the self-reflection of the practice and scientific partners involved. This insight is consistent with the recommendations already made by Parodi et al. to ensure "co-created accompaniment that supports real-world laboratories in a cooperative, advisory manner" [own translation] (2018: 179).

#### **11.4 A Summary Critical Appraisal and Outlook**

Real-world laboratories are a relatively young and yet highly diverse format that is interpreted and shaped in a strongly divergent manner by practitioners in some cases. The debate has only just begun and is still being shaped. In principle, many of the characteristics of real-world laboratories discussed are not new for sustainable land management, such as the development of common problem definitions and solutions (co-design, co-production), as is often the case especially in informal processes of sustainable urban and regional developments. What is more, knowledge on participation in planning processes also virtually serves as a role model for real-world laboratories (Eckart et al. 2018: 131ff; Kanning 2018). As such, real-world laboratory formats are compatible with sustainable land management, and also offer added value. Especially real-world laboratory formats that are initiated and coordinated by practitioner stakeholders offer specific implementation potential and, at the same time, are faced with particular challenges.

In our opinion, the direct and explicit integration of objectives for practice and research associated with the real-world laboratory format (Defila and Di Giulio 2018c: 40) represents particular added value over common participatory land management processes. In real-world laboratories, all of the stakeholders involved, whether practitioners or scientists, are considered to be "researchers" [own translation] (Eckart et al. 2018: 105f) who jointly define the solution to the problem and produce new knowledge (co-design, co-production), integrating different specialist disciplines as well as science and practice. In contrast to the planning and development approaches established in land management, an extended self-conception can be identified that could help bridge the oft-criticised gap between theory and practice (e.g. Lamker et al. 2017). In real-world laboratories, the transformation approach is oriented to radical innovations and change processes towards sustainability in a much more proactive manner than is often the case to date in sustainable urban and regional development processes (see Heyen et al. 2018: 26). Where the principle of sustainable development is reflected critically and understood integratively in correspondence with the state of scientific knowledge in real-world laboratories, this goes beyond the current prevailing understanding of sustainability in land management. The latter focuses primarily on the safeguarding or creation of ecological qualities, and pays little attention to the original core of the idea of sustainability, i.e. the transformation of social, economic action in a social-ecological direction (see Kanning 2005; Hofmeister 2014). In this connection, it would also be necessary to include in the discussion the generally inherent, unquestioned concept of material growth (see Fröhlich and Gerhard 2017: 28ff). As such, the real-world laboratory format—in line with the design currently featuring strongly in the scientific discourse—could help establish experimental spaces for radical innovations in which the various areas of expertise in transformation and planning (science) are brought together for sustainable land management and, ideally, linked to educational objectives (see Beecroft et al. 2018: 78).

Real-world laboratories that are initiated and coordinated by practitioner stakeholders also offer special deployment potential due their practical approach, and at the same time face special challenges. On that point, a number of insights and hypotheses can be summarised from EAA's experiences and discussions for further scientific discourse and practical development:

Practitioner stakeholders must satisfy various conditions and have certain skills to be able to initiate real-world laboratories. Among other things, they must be capable of organising a research alliance; making their results publicly accessible; and participating in scientific discourse. They must also either have their own financial resources for conducting research or at least have a strong position in the relevant stakeholder network, enabling them to generate the financial resources needed to operate a real-world laboratory.

Scientific and practitioner stakeholders often face the same challenges when establishing the research process, because the interests of many stakeholders must be accommodated when it comes to complex transformation processes. There is always a need to formulate issues in a practically relevant as well as scientifically interesting and challenging manner at the constituent stage of the project, irrespective of the real-world laboratory initiator's institutional background. It is only the weighting of the practical and scientific relevance that may vary to a certain extent. The good position of a research-affine practitioner stakeholder may make it easier to develop stable stakeholder networks for the purpose of achieving cooperation among the relevant practitioner stakeholders, but the various aspects of effective participation must be borne in mind nonetheless. On the other hand, practitioner stakeholders find it particularly challenging to find scientific partners from several disciplines who go along with a joint problem definition and who are not only interested in obtaining data or conducting purely scientific experiments. In addition, social or economic practitioners who have initiated real-world laboratories tend to be challenged more by the need for experience in methods of knowledge integration and modelling for the purpose of transferring results. One solution for this may be to seek support from experienced transdisciplinary researchers and to involve these experts in the conceptual design stage of the real-world laboratory.

Based on these findings, real-world laboratories led by practitioner stakeholders offer particularly favourable conditions when they are backed by local authorities or public bodies. Strong local governments have excellent links; they know the stakeholders' interests; they have experience in planning participatory processes, which can be largely transferred to real-world laboratories (Eckart et al. 2018: 131ff); they can perpetuate transdisciplinary research, ensuring continuity and, on this basis, learning processes. However, small and medium-sized towns, and towns undergoing socio-economic structural change that feature disproportionate demographics are often under financial supervision and rarely have the human resources capacity to be able to undertake the research that is urgently required for their strategic realignment. Such local authorities therefore tend to be unable to support real-world laboratories, which means that they are only rarely able to incorporate their particular problems in research projects. Consequently, support structures are required to make real-world laboratories accessible to all local authority types.

Against this backdrop, real-world laboratories should not only be financed by research funding in the future, but at least in equal parts by structural support from the relevant ministries (e.g. the Ministry of Energy and/or the Ministry for Economic Affairs). After all, besides producing effects in research and science, real-world laboratories (are supposed to) actively drive forward transformation towards a sustainable society (see Kanning and Scurrell 2018).

Several recent changes in science and structural policy will improve the conditions for real-world laboratories initiated by practitioner stakeholders in future. These include a greater shift towards citizen science, including its transformation towards to more complex civic research beyond mere data collection. Citizens are more frequently involved in the formulation of research issues, and the definition of criteria for data collection and analysis. Various institutions besides universities and research institutes give citizens the possibility to participate in research. The "Green Paper Citizen Sciences Strategy 2020 for Germany", published in 2016, provides guidance on activating citizen science for the purpose of transformation that is appreciated, acknowledged and embraced by society and science alike (Bonn et al. 2016: 25). From the perspective of practitioner stakeholders, it is important to create stronger links in future between citizen science formats, ranging from data collection to active codesign and active co-production (ibid.), to the original real-world laboratory format developed by science, creating synergies. In addition, since the 2017 Bundestag elections at the latest, greater attention is being paid in structural policy to the development of rural regions and their small and medium-sized towns. If such attention can also be translated into supporting measures for the sustainable development of rural areas, there will be new financial leeway for real-world laboratories, which can be established and used as experimental spaces for sustainable land management.

#### **References**

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# **Chapter 12 Knowledge Management for Sustainability: The Spatial Dimension of Higher Education as an Opportunity for Land Management**

#### **Jens Schulz, Thomas Köhler, and Thomas Weith**

**Abstract** The production and dissemination of knowledge are seen as essential elements of sustainable land management (Salet 2014; Kaiser et al. 2016). Digitalisation creates a variety of opportunities for knowledge creation and communication. Knowledge cooperation and digitalisation for governance of land is a concept coined by the various and perhaps diverse interests of diverse stakeholders. In the era of digitalisation, new developments trigger further changes that may be of a challenging nature. However, digitalisation also offers innovative options for collaborative activity in land use, bringing together these diverse interests and eventually enabling new patterns of collaboration. The authors address principal patterns of collaboration in multi-stakeholder networks that have only recently been considered meaningful for research. Concepts from both domains—higher education and land management—are advantageously combined, allowing new interpretations of spatial and digital artefacts. Digitalisation is dramatically changing the knowledgerelated domain itself at the end of the 2010s. Besides encouraging new teaching and learning activities, new technologies also have an impact on knowledge spaces and on the institutional and personnel knowledge carriers established therein. However, the institutional and sectoral development of academic education practice has rarely been addressed in the context of higher education research. To illustrate the new way in which knowledge management is directed under such conditions, the authors briefly present digital networks from both sectors. Obviously, different layers of

J. Schulz

T. Köhler (B)

#### T. Weith

Institute of Knowledge Transfer and Digital Transformation, University of Applied Sciences, Technikumplatz 17, Mittweida, Germany e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
Faculty of Education, TU Dresden, Weberplatz 5, Dresden, Germany e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
Institut für Umweltwissenschaften und Geographie, University of Potsdam, Campus-Golm, Karl-Liebknecht-Str. 24-25, Potsdam 14476, Germany e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
Working Group "Co-Design of Change and Innovation", Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research, Eberswalder Str. 84, Müncheberg 15374, Germany

stakeholders (state ministries and other authorities; higher education institutions and their sub-units, and other societal actors, etc.) need to collaborate in order to define and run the processes prevailing in and for higher education. How do these spatially distributed institutions interrelate in order to co-design the higher education landscape across an entire federal state? Which structures and processes are applied in co-design practices? Consequently, this paper outlines these developments, and combines knowledge economics, educational geography and educational science approaches in the context of higher education research.

**Keywords** Land management · Higher education · Digitalisation · Knowledge management · Sustainability

#### **12.1 Introduction**

The production of new knowledge and the dissemination of knowledge are seen as essential elements of sustainable land management (Salet 2014; Kaiser et al. 2016). Digitalisation creates a variety of opportunities for knowledge creation and communication. Until now, new methods have mainly been discussed and implemented in research projects and programmes. But how can knowledge creation be combined with processes in the higher education system in the context of digitalisation? And what opportunities exist for sustainable land use and spatial development under these circumstances? Besides developing single curricula, the following chapter will reflect on the spatial conceptual models behind current practices in higher education, enabling the authors to discuss alternatives for the future in this field of knowledge creation and dissemination.

Digital media, as a core component and important output of digitalisation processes, differs significantly from conventional knowledge media, given that it emphasises cooperative action—whether in the form of human-machine interaction or as interpersonal mediated communication (Köhler 2006). Friedrich W. Hesse, the founding director of the Leibniz Institute for Knowledge Media in Tübingen, pointed out: "Through digital resources, a knowledge space is changing and knowledge work is changing" (Hesse 2017). Although in this case knowledge space stands for a mathematical structure that reflects the results of the learning process, the knowledge work clearly refers to a spatially effective size in the geographical understanding, since production, storage and transfer of knowledge require appropriate infrastructures or people.

Scientific discourse in spatial sciences (e.g. Kaiser et al. 2017) outlines how relevant opportunities for collaborative activity in land use occur, possibly bringing together diverse interests and eventually enabling new patterns of collaboration to be detected. Has research been able to identify principal structures of collaborative interrelations in multi-stakeholder networks? And how will governance models be affected? This aspect is especially relevant in the European context, where equal living conditions are quite often an underlying political target of spatial development, and where spatial justice is often seen as a basis for the distribution of both infrastructure and subsidies. Addressing these rather complex questions, the authors seek to open up the agenda for a theoretical discourse and subsequently an empirical discourse, to be documented in the present chapter. A possibly innovative momentum will be developed from the combination of theoretical domains—knowledge cooperation and digitalisation in higher education for the governance of land, which have so far been rather independent.

An interdisciplinary analysis of the technological, social, (organisation) didactic and policy-related challenges is required so as not only to accompany, but also to shape developments in the concrete case. The link between digitalisation and the concept of space is addressed by introducing the concept of knowledge as an interface. Future research in digitised knowledge cooperation will be linked with research and explanatory approaches of higher education research and research on informational land use, applying aspects such as organisational research, the knowledge economy and educational geography.

First, the authors provide a brief introduction to the status quo of the two chosen domains—research on knowledge in land management (related to information and communication, and relevant technologies) and higher education research (focusing on e-learning, organisational development and digitalisation).

## *12.1.1 Generating and Disseminating Knowledge for Sustainable Land Use*

Knowledge can generally be understood as the conscious processing and adoption of information. In the same vein, knowledge is also defined as the process of purposeful connection of information (North 2011: 36f). Change processes, also in land use, are characterised by making individual knowledge accessible to the actors involved (Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995). New knowledge is generated by the cyclical repetition of the internalisation of information and processing into knowledge (learning), and its externalisation (communication). Learning, feedback and communication thus serve the purpose of knowledge generation and knowledge dissemination, supported by the moderation of intermediaries. In recent years, considerable progress has been made with regard to the development and availability of codified knowledge stocks and new knowledge generation processes by digitalisation.

The handling of real sustainability problems such as challenges in land use depends on the production and dissemination of new knowledge produced in this way. This is often developed in transdisciplinary settings in a co-design approach. Such practice enables the integration of different forms of knowledge, resulting, in particular, from the diversity of practitioners involved in the research process. As a result, contributions to the solution of complex societal challenges are grouped around problems, rather than scientific disciplines (Pohl 2014).

With sustainability research in mind, several authors stress the need for this kind of research; the current lack of knowledge; and new methods of knowledge management (e.g. Miller et al. 2014: 244; Kajikawa et al. 2014). For several years, research efforts have focused more on producing the knowledge required to understand the challenges. Until now, the 'quality and validity of knowledge systems in the context of sustainability research' have been a major challenge (Cornell et al. 2013) within knowledge systems (ibid.: 61).

Scientific debates in this context are accompanied by science policy debates and political discourses. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) document is an important political statement in this context. Knowledge management is addressed in three SDG objectives (Goal 4: quality education; Goal 16: peace, justice and strong institutions; and Goal 17: partnerships for the goals). It is simultaneously linked to education and lifelong learning. An explicit reference to digitalisation is also mentioned for the first time in the SDGs. Besides being relevant to many sustainability goals, digitalisation is explicitly addressed in sub-goal 9c (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure): "To substantially improve access to information and communication technology and to ensure universal and affordable access to the Internet in at least developed countries by 2020".1 The accompanying "Future Earth" research process is of great importance for the development and implementation of the SDGs. This global network focuses on the development and dissemination of new knowledge and the exchange of knowledge (www.futureearth.org). One of the network's explicit goals is to support the transformation towards sustainability. The associated research agenda states that this also requires a new form of knowledge generation across disciplinary boundaries, together with social partners.

While knowledge is a precondition for action, co-designed processes for the generation and management of knowledge are considered to be core elements for sustainable spatial development and land use (Salet 2014). Davoudi (2015) grasps the knowledge-action relationship in a manner that defines "planning as practice of knowing". In this context, knowledge is quite often based on a variety of experiences in practice, embedded in social networks and organisational structures (Zimmermann 2010: 118). In this way, knowledge production and dissemination is not a single task to be addressed by several experts, but is accompanied by regional and local knowledge from a variety of actors.

The processes must be complemented by actors who manage the processes of knowledge cooperation or learning. This task often involves moderating, comparable to the tasks of facilitators and, in some cases, mediating actors (cf. Stützer et al. 2013). Moderation implements the "cohesion function", i.e. guiding group work, keeping the group together, introducing rules, overseeing, and harmonising group members, as well as the "locomotion function", i.e. setting group work in motion, and ensuring effective and focused working methods (Ziegler 1993). On this basis, the mediating actor fulfils two functions: those of discussion leader and consultant. Another concept of facilitated interaction is that of intermediaries, which is close to the method of moderation. Millar and Choi (2003) define knowledge intermediaries

1https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/envision2030.html

as organisations that "facilitate a recipient's measurement of the intangible value of knowledge received" (ibid.: 269). One function of the knowledge intermediary is to provide firms and/or knowledge producers with technology and knowledge transfer processes in the context of regional innovation systems (Parker and Hine 2013). The findings about intermediaries provide helpful information for determining who is responsible for knowledge management. Recent approaches often refer to the changing role of knowledge professionals. This role may even disappear completely, such as in the case where the question is asked: "Does a class need a teacher?" (Köhler and Kahnwald 2005). Indeed, greater emphasis is placed on sharing interests in practice than on following a predefined curriculum (Kahnwald and Köhler 2007).

Regarding the transfer of knowledge, the use of a unidirectional or one-way transfer from knowledge producers to knowledge consumers (also called "mode 1") to deal with information and knowledge flows cannot adequately reflect the challenges of a decision-making process or of a planning support process in a complex multi-stakeholder environment. This mode of science-policy interaction can be described as the "science push" and/or the "demand pull" model (Dilling and Lemos 2011). The new focus of knowledge transfer activities also considers the communication, translation and mediation of knowledge (Cash et al. 2003). Gibbons et al. (1994) call this focus "mode 2 knowledge" in the context of transdisciplinary research. The experiences of transdisciplinary research, primarily characterised by the cooperation of scientists and practitioner stakeholders, confirm the barriers and disadvantages of "mode-1" versus "mode-2" knowledge production (cf. Hirsch Hadorn et al. 2008). Thus, assembling different stakeholders in various groups throughout the planning process is one of the crucial conditions for a sustainable decision-making process and a key pillar of the currently consolidating concept of transdisciplinarity (Gibbons et al. 1994; Pohl 2011; Opdam et al. 2015). From this point of view, mutual collaboration of the stakeholders concerned is required in order to support knowledge production, transfer and implementation—this is the idea behind the concept of the co-production of knowledge (Pohl et al. 2010; Enengel et al. 2012). Lemos and Morehouse (2005) argue that an iterative and interactive model for the co-production of science and policy requires interdisciplinarity, stakeholder participation and the production of usable knowledge, which can be incorporated into all stakeholders' decision-making processes. They also acknowledge in this context that usable knowledge "not only must be tailored to fit stakeholders' needs and uses, but must also be made accessible to those users" (ibid.: 62).

Usability, accessibility and transferability depend in many ways on "producers" and "producing processes". Perspectives on challenges and problems define the starting points of agenda processes. Co-design processes are essential, followed by the co-production of knowledge, accompanied by exchange and interaction (Mauser et al. 2013: 427). In consequence, one of the most important questions at the beginning of the process is whom to define as an important actor. In addition, actor networks and organisational units are highly relevant, because single actors are embedded, and also develop and share knowledge within their organisations. In consequence, the use of transdisciplinary approaches also means exchanging knowledge between organisations that start bargaining processes, and developing framing narratives in institutional settings. This will raise awareness beyond projects to whole systems such as higher education.

## *12.1.2 New Ways of Knowledge Generation, Dissemination and Management: Higher Education Research with a Focus on E-Learning, Organisational Development and Digitalisation*

The institutional and sectoral development of academic education practice has rarely been addressed in the context of higher education research. While a major interest of education research is linked to understanding specific didactic effects, the interdisciplinary approach is crucial to cope with the complexity of organisational relationships and the institutional contexts in which the digitalisation of higher education takes place. Decision-making and the forecasting of such processes appear to be challenging in this sector. Dimensions to be covered include the following aspects or areas of research and practice:

The professions represented in higher education development committees should ideally reflect these four points. But what does this mean for knowledge practices in a completely digitised knowledge society with more and more immaterial goods? Indeed, it is also possible to recruit expertise at any time and disseminate it through various exchange formats within research or practice communities, or to elaborate such expertise in projects via digital media and relevant formats of collaboration. As a result, higher education research must consider society in general in order to gain an appropriate understanding of how knowledge is generated, shared and transferred. Extending such understanding would also require ideas about spatial organisation beyond the embedding of this knowledge-related practice in the physical space of educational buildings.

#### **12.2 Digitalisation of Higher Education**

## *12.2.1 Classification into Megatrends of the Twenty-First Century*

Two thematic areas are particularly striking when analysing current global megatrends: there are demographic and social scientific considerations as well as economic interpretations. In many cases, however, the boundaries between these domains are fluid because there are interactions and links between them. In addition, each of these megatrends can be accompanied by current developments in the field of education, which require detailed analysis in terms of digitalisation processes. Interesting connections can be established, particularly for universities (see Table 12.1).

The challenges presented here are only examples, and are not consistent in the list. They provide an overview in the sense of impetus, seeking to reveal the connections that are currently important to the education system. With regard to conclusions and consequences, the table shows how important it is to combine new forms of knowledge management with higher education. This goes hand in hand with the changing framework conditions, particularly in higher education, from a greater focus on the labour market, to digitalisation, globalisation and new forms of governance.

**Table 12.1** Global megatrends (Stang and Eigenbrodt 2014: 233ff) and exemplary challenges for higher education in the context of German approaches

aThis term, first introduced by Marshall McLuhan in 1962, is a media-theoretical description of the world that grows together through electronic networking (in the sense of electronic interdependence) (McLuhan 2008)

## *12.2.2 Digital Media and the Resulting Changes in Higher Education Teaching and Learning*

The digitalisation of (higher) education unfortunately remains an issue that fails to create an optimistic and positive image of the future among the public (Schulz 2018). This is certainly not unfounded and is sometimes important; but as a societal cross-cutting task, there should at least be a vision for action in the future. However, digital transformation in education is particularly evident when comparing courses requiring presence to online courses. The example of "seminar versus webinar" shows the extent to which change is generally understood. In universities, students often sit in rows facing the lecturer, with a notebook or tablet on their desks in front of them, while students interact with teachers or each other, depending on the nature of the course. The lecturer uses a digital projector to show PowerPoint slides. The difference to face-to-face courses 20 years ago is astounding: notebooks and tablets take the place of books and paper; PowerPoint presentations have ousted the blackboard. Features may, of course, depend on the teacher and the subject culture, but most courses, whether seminars or lectures, now take place in such a format. Indeed, recent forecasting using scenario and Delphi techniques suggests that there will no longer be any pure offline educational situations by 2030 (Köhler et al. 2018, 2019).

Webinars are purely online seminars. They dissolve the physical space of the course, as both lecturers and students can participate from anywhere. Citizens of the "global village" come together in a virtual space; link up with knowledge of others in real time; generate their own knowledge; and finally share that knowledge with others. On closer inspection, however, most offers are a 1:1 transfer of the seminar concept to a non-physical space: the lecturer determines the degree of interaction by assigning rights; students sit (or lie) in front of a computer with an image transfer of the lecturer and the PowerPoint slides, and note important information in virtual and/or physical exercise books. Although there has been significant progress with digitally enhanced courses in terms of participation in educational processes, the opportunities associated with digital technologies are rarely fully exploited.

As mentioned above, digital teaching and learning technologies also open up new opportunities for imparting knowledge and learning material. Media didactics differentiate between "traditional" and "new" media formats. Traditional media formats are understood to be mainly analogue texts, images, graphics, presentations, films, videos and audio files. In this case, information and communication technologies are used for unidirectional performance or instruction. Newer mediation formats allow students to apply knowledge, obtain feedback or interact with fellow students in a more connectivist, co-constructionist way. As a consequence, the spatial distance is no longer decisive, but online access and interaction possibilities are

Excursus: Online interactions include video, audio and chat conferences, and digitally based forums, as well as digital simulations and business games, etests, common media products, wikis and blogs. Riedel et al. (2017) found in a survey among all lecturers at universities in Saxony that the use of traditional media formats clearly predominates. More than 98 per cent of the respondents stated that they used texts, presentations, graphics and images in digital form, almost 77 per cent used films, videos and audio files. In contrast, the new media formats mentioned, which encourage interaction, are only part of the teaching portfolio for about a third of the teaching staff (e.g. forums: 37.3%; e-tests: 24.8%).

At first glance, the primary media-didactic question about the use of different media formats in teaching seems to have little spatial impact in the geographical sense. However, if one includes social and communicative aspects of virtual cooperation, changes in the room can be expected. Regardless of an increase in the degree of use of such new media formats, devaluation, or at least a reclassification of currently used learning spaces, may occur. In contrast, new learning spaces are being created in places that are not yet intended for such use. Examples include spaces used while commuting to university, and student services cafés.

## **12.3 Spatial Dimensions: Informal Spaces and New Learning Worlds in Adult and Continuing Education**

## *12.3.1 Governmental Argumentation in Favour of Digital Continuous Education*

Official education policy, however, seems to consider online elements of education as being rather relevant for postgraduate education. Yet educational processes also take place outside of schools and universities. In adult and continuing education in particular, far-reaching developments can be observed, and are expected in the years ahead. The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi), for example, helps companies to digitise their business processes or sales channels, or to develop personnel by way of digitised training and e-learning. The ministry argues for the latter as follows: "If employees can use digital media for further training, companies and employees benefit:

In the context of equal spatial development through digitalisation in education, the key words in this list are "location and time independent", "networked across locations …" and "no travel expenses". The interpretation can go so far that digitalised educational offers mean that traders and their employees in peripheral, rural areas no longer have to fear location disadvantages with regard to further and advanced training. All the necessary events and training courses, including the product training mentioned, would be ubiquitously available, contributing to equal opportunities between differently characterised areas and regions.

## *12.3.2 Changes in Organisational Learning and Communication Behaviour*

What conclusions can be drawn concerning the domain of educational governance? On the one hand, political aims and targets stress the desire for equal living conditions and fair opportunities for development. In recent years, discourses about new modes of governance have stressed development policies away from simply state-driven hierarchical systems towards integrative approaches, adopting the variety of actors' positions and network organisation. The organisational and regulatory system coordinates interaction between state and non-state actors of all kinds. "It is … about how we establish goals, how we define rules for reaching the defined goals, and finally how we control outcomes following from the use of these rules" (Vatn 2005). There will be fewer conflicts, and common goals will be achieved.

On the other hand, there are still differences between rural areas and urban regions concerning the use and acceptance of digital resources.2 An additional aspect that has only been so far been given little consideration is the potential different patterns of information culture between urban versus rural regions and their inhabitants. Indeed, the research literature shows that this topic of organisational learning and communication behaviour is a relatively undiscovered territory when it comes to the question of implementing information and communications technologies (ICT).

Another contradictory observation in relation to the far-reaching potential of technologies is the observation that administrative advantages are often serve an easy entry point of ICT into any domain, before applications arrive in the sectoral practices. For example, in education learning was mainly adopting administrative moments before educational practice started to reform (Erber et al. 2004). However, recent studies on ICT-based management procedures in general education (Bergner

2https://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web/breitband-ausbau-auf-dem-land-hinkt-hinterher-a-130 2174.html

2019) confirm that virtually no schools in Germany apply enterprise resource planning (ERP) technologies, which are commonplace in industry, not even in a simple way.

As information and communication devices, and related applications, increasingly penetrate everyday private and professional life, behaviours also change. However, learning can also take place in informal arrangements, whilst formal settings can be configured and enriched in very different ways to one or two decades ago. This new learning behaviour is characterised by:

This has been described briefly in Sect. 12.2. But a second change can already be observed in addition to "new learning", because the new technical conditions are able to turn almost all learners into lecturers (whereby this term should be used with caution, since it is usually associated with a formally proven teaching qualification). Any individual who believes that they have specific knowledge or have solved a practical problem can create an explanatory video with the simplest of means; upload it onto an appropriate internet platform; and hope that interested parties will find it. It instantaneously becomes an educational offer, even though the material may have not been elaborated with didactics in mind, and can be integrated into formal learning arrangements without any barriers. A seventh point "Knowledge transfer through production and distribution" can therefore be added to the above description of learning behaviour, whereby "Changed communication behaviour during the learning process" would be a more precise description in many cases.

## *12.3.3 Economic Versus Educational Perspectives: A Sample Case*

To illustrate this development in the educational versus economic domain, the authors decided to present a sample case in the context of one of the largest German university associations for digital learning, the Education Portal Saxony (*Bildungsportal Sachsen*).The goal of this collaborative project, established only in 2019–2020, focusing on "virtual teaching cooperation", is to pilot cross-university teaching processes, taking into account the didactics of collaborative teaching and learning, ideally in a specialist domain and possibly between different university types. It also seeks to develop solutions for cooperation with international partners. Furthermore, the project seeks to promote the subject-independent (interdisciplinary) qualification of educational staff to strengthen the effectiveness of the self-regulation of students in online or blended learning scenarios in such open collaborative networks, for example by acquiring online tutoring skills and abilities. Finally, individual Saxonywide preliminary courses and online self-assessment tests are supported with the use and creation of open educational resources (OER).3

## **12.4 Interactions of Space and Education in the Context of Digitalisation**

#### *12.4.1 The Spatial Dimension*

Digitalization goes far beyond purely economic applications, and therefore illustrates the specific relevance for spatial and land-related developments. The link between digitalisation and the concept of space is addressed at this point by introducing the concept of knowledge as an interface. An outline has already been given of how the acquisition of knowledge using new information and communication tools will change, and continue to change. The possibilities of the location-independent and time-independent design of educational processes reveal that digitalisation is not a point-source event, but one that takes place in an area. The concept of knowledge in its spatial dimension is analysed as the central point of the discourse, since all actors become effective as part of their complex spatial environments.

New dynamics subsequently arise following the detachment of the physical connection of knowledge and information towards individuals. The concept of knowledge regions, which, when understood traditionally, was based on geographical, almost demarcated areas and easily comprehensible actor interactions, needs to be readjusted in the light of digitalisation. It can be assumed that there will be developments towards differentiated knowledge networks or global knowledge clusters, i.e. the spatial dimension will decline in favour of the knowledge economy, meaning that planning processes for any education domain will take place in new spatial thinking patterns.

## *12.4.2 Relevant Knowledge Economics and Educational Geographic Assumptions*

It makes sense to use other relevant knowledge-economic and educational geographic assumptions to understand the spatial dimension described above. Initially, these must be interpreted as being detached from parallel digitalisation. Yet it is obvious

3https://bildungsportal.sachsen.de/portal/parentpage/projekte/hochschulvorhaben/projekte-2019- 2020/virtuelle-lehrkooperationen

that a process is already taking place on a national or global scale, receiving new dynamics through digitalisation, which will certainly be preserved.

The first assumption relates to the production and (re)use of knowledge. Innovation processes are driven accordingly by different knowledge bases (Kujath and Peiker 2014), i.e. by networking knowledge producers in specialist communities or the ubiquity of classic and new knowledge media. The emergence of innovations is basically conceivable anytime, anywhere. In these traditional knowledge networks, places and regions, institutions and organisations are interconnected, forming the common basis for processes that can then culminate in a result.

This is followed by a second assumption, which states that competition and cooperation within a common theme are not mutually exclusive, and take place regionally, supra-regionally and globally. There are fixed interaction mechanisms between actors, which may be both different and of the same institutional type, e.g.

This is likely to have the greatest possible impact on each individual network member (Fromhold-Eisebith 2010). In addition to this concept, Kujath (2010) offers a third assumption for the above-mentioned interaction processes, which are also not only a social element, but primarily a transfer of knowledge and know-how: specialised transaction service providers support the transfer of knowledge between people, network nodes, knowledge regions and organisations. These are groups of actors who collect, store and process knowledge, and do business with it. Information and knowledge have, in fact, become a global commodity. However, the economic pursuit of profit need not necessarily be in the foreground, because not only international conferences or—with the leap towards digitalisation—operators of digital research and open access, but also publication networks may act as transfer service providers. Such a process has been described by Köhler and Schilde (2003) for higher education institutions by adopting the information broker concept from industry. The main finding would be moving away from thinking about territories and places, to inter-relational spaces. This would have to be reconsidered in the higher education system, in the sense of theoretical analysis.

## *12.4.3 Exemplary Developments in the Context of Research on Knowledge Networks in Land Use in Germany*

One example of web-based knowledge platforms is the "Sustainable Land Management" knowledge platform, which simultaneously supports and implements aspects of communication and learning (www.nachhaltiges-landmanagement.de/en/library/ documents). The platform also contains a discussion forum. The aim of the platform is primarily to enable the exchange of information and codified knowledge. An online forum is the basis for developing a community of practice (CoP) for all those involved in the funding measure provided by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, i.e. scientists, practitioners, representatives from authorities, and so on. The platform enables research results and products to be exchanged, analysed and discussed, also to jointly initiate learning processes for sustainable land management (Weith and Kaiser 2015).

The platform has a graphical user interface. In addition to full-text search, the knowledge base can also be accessed by category-based search. Knowledge resources are differentiated according to products, target group, topics, regions and projects in sustainable land management. On the next level, these five categories are subdivided again into group-specific headings, which also feature selected keywords.

The interactive knowledge platform enabled all registered users to upload their own contributions (texts, images, etc.) between 2013 and 2018. Indexing of the uploaded contributions in the upload area (input mask for uploading contributions) played a major role. Indexing of contributions by the knowledge provider ensures that knowledge stocks can be accessed by category. Category-based access enables knowledge seekers to control the search results. The uploaded contributions were simultaneously made available for discussion in the forum.

In addition to the creation of a knowledge platform, presentations for formalised educational units for higher education were also developed (*Weiterbildungsmodule*). These units, which focus on a specific topic (e.g. the connection of supply chain management and sustainable land management), are also included in the knowledge platform, besides being specifically disseminated to organisations that deliver vocational training.

In a recent study, Köhler et al. (2019) argue that, in 10 years' time, higher education will resemble augmented human-computer interaction that actively combines educational offers from different educational institutions in a virtual space. In their fourth scenario, entitled "Open educational resources + open science - informal learning using the offers of several universities on the basis of recommender systems", they state that "opening up of the university through digitalisation means that study programs or learning objects from various providers are becoming more and more widespread" when simultaneously "offers from the university are made accessible to external users – which, although technically possible, has barely been implemented." The authors primarily see the following characteristics in this scenario:

As a result, universities may enable the portfolio-based networking of learners, brought together on the basis of suitable portfolios, also when working on interdisciplinary topics, known as "knowledge dating" (ibid.), which leave geographical limitations behind.

#### **12.5 Discussion and Summary Remarks**

## *12.5.1 A Solution? Multifaceted, Networked Digital Knowledge Construction as an Opportunity for Equal Spatial Development*

What options are available for the geographic design of educational spaces? We note tendencies to dissociate the offerings of place and time dependencies, and note tremendous technological advances, which always seem to be one step ahead of the previously proven teaching/learning scenarios. However, if one seeks a creative futurist approach not just in the educational meaning, but also in the spatial planning sense, then we need a new interpretation of geographical/physical space.

In this sense, spatial planning will shift more from functional place-making towards the creation of a virtual network of knowledge co-creators and adopters. This may be easy to imagine using the example of "grassland becomes a land for building maintenance" but, of course, it is harder for us to shift from physical reality to a digital, mediated reality of digital products and environments. As a result, at least two perspectives of knowledge cooperation and digitalisation in the higher education sector for spatial governance can be identified:

1. So far, the integration of different knowledge bases in educational processes has been characterised by information systems and the physical participation of actors (lecturers, students, and to a lesser extent, administrative staff). This is the currently widespread approach of e-learning or online education. However, the practice of education, especially in the higher education sector, is still strongly related to the physical location; regional virtualisation is hardly practiced, if at all. Virtual university cooperation is also neglected. For Saxony, this is evident in the goal of a joint project, initiated only in 2019/2020, focusing on "virtual teaching cooperation" to pilot cross-university teaching networking, taking into account the didactics of collaborative teaching and learning, ideally in a specialist domain and possibly between different types of university. Surprisingly, the newly published coalition agreement of December 2019 states: "Digital forms of teaching and learning as well as open learning materials should find their way into all subjects. We create incentives for this through an innovation fund and drive the digital networking of study programmes. In the long run, the Virtual University of Saxony can act as a shared platform."4 This could also be regarded as a solution for cooperation with international partners. Furthermore, the subject-independent (interdisciplinary) qualification of educational staff should be promoted to strengthen the effectiveness of the self-regulation of students in online or blended learning scenarios, for example by acquiring online tutoring skills and abilities. Finally, individual Saxony-wide preliminary courses and online self-assessments are supported with the use and creation of OER.5

2. In the future, an innovative approach could be the cross-location consideration of partly new forms of generating and disseminating knowledge and learning as a starting point. In this respect, the network—the meaning to be generated in coconstruction—becomes the starting point and replaces the primarily local focus, which is usually only brought together in a few cases afterwards. Area-related co-existence is also practiced, especially in the higher education sector, overcoming the primary location reference. Indeed, examples exist of such common practices of operating and, above all, using digital educational infrastructures. These include the Saxony educational portal6 (as mentioned above), the education servers of school administrations, and the nationwide network for open educational resources, represented by OER Info7 at the German Institute for Educational Research (DIPF). Obviously, one may find examples of shared developments across individual institutions, leading to new institutional forms.

What are the lessons learned from and opportunities for equal spatial development? As already shown, digitalisation enables especially peripheral and rural areas to participate fully in educational processes. However, this aspiration has only been met to a certain degree as yet because there is no successful interplay of a nationally available, powerful and sustainable digital infrastructure, digital services, and the highest possible degree of innovation. The Digitalization Strategy of the Free State of Saxony calls for the facilitation of a "high quality and attractiveness of a digital offer for all areas of life" (cf. SMWA 2019: 15). It is important to note, however, that uninterrupted broadband access is an urgent requirement that had not yet been met by 2019, especially in the rural areas of Saxony. In this respect, great hopes are associated with the introduction of the new 5G standard in mobile communications, which is an essential element of the infrastructure for networked systems, such as required for autonomous driving on roads.

In his recent study on how to apply digitalisation in education in an effort to trigger opportunities for equal spatial development, Schulz (2018) proposes reorganising broadband expansion and related investments in the digital infrastructure in special-purpose (public or municipal) associations. Indeed, he suggests that such

4https://www.spd-sachsen.de/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Koalitionsvertrag\_2019-2024.pdf (cf. page 16)

5https://bildungsportal.sachsen.de/portal/parentpage/projekte/hochschulvorhaben/projekte-2019- 2020/virtuelle-lehrkooperationen

6https://bildungsportal.sachsen.de

7https://open-educational-resources.de

a transformation should also take place in wastewater disposal and public transport. After all, the digital infrastructure, and to some extent water and wastewater disposal and public transport, are not only needed in five years' time, but are now required for today's sustainably planned public services. In this way, a political solution could be created in which public institutions or even the municipalities, serve as stakeholders and act independently or in place of commercial providers. The fact that the federal states and the federal government act as a driving force would certainly support this development, enabling rural communities to move into the digitised future at greater speed.

With regard to the education sector and, detached from the discussion about broadband expansion, Schulz (2018) suggests that the existing physical and digital function and area types in cities and municipalities be recorded and rededicated to new learning, information, knowledge and transfer spaces. These would be interlinked places for education, enriched with digitised offers, whereby no clear assignment is possible or necessary in every case. After all, not only classrooms, public libraries, cafés, city parks, or in fact any public space, as well as workplaces and living rooms at home can be used as places of learning. In this way, learning islands are created which, thanks to their equipment and characteristics, meet learners' individual needs. In a digitised world, the physical offer would feature interfaces, enabling these islands to be integrated and linked to multifaceted8 educational spaces that grow together. Reallocations and functional extensions would end the need for a one and only educational infrastructure. The physical location is left behind to enable learning regardless of time and location, with the ideal scenario being a convergence of physical and digital space. Mobile learning already addresses such a media design—but what functions then remain for physical locations?

#### *12.5.2 Three Assumptions*

Finally, the question of equal spatial development should be asked again. The authors suggest that digitalisation offers considerable opportunities, such as compensating for location disadvantages or developing peripheral regions into attractive places to work and live. Since digitalisation reduces distances to educational offers, this takes place in two directions: a Berlin resident can attend an interesting course online with a provider in Paris, whilst a Parisian can take advantage of an educational provider's offer from Berlin.

With regard to land use and spatial development, governance should reflect actorbased functional interrelations in coupled spaces more broadly. Current scientific discussions have proposed initial options (Newig et al. 2019). To connect spatial planning with the development of higher education systems, the overall framing concept must first be revised as described above. In addition, actors' roles must be

8The term "multifaceted" is derived from the description of a transformation option for libraries by Eigenbrodt (2014)

redefined. Specialist areas that previously only held advisory roles, as well as civil society, with its needs and independent initiatives, must be involved in the planning process. Bottom-up and top-down actors then form a planning process that takes all aspects into account, contributing to the equal development of educational spaces.

As shown by Köhler and Schilde (2003) and Schulz (2018), many different factors affect the topic of digitalisation, education and space. On the one hand, there are users' behaviours arising from the technical possibilities. These are characterised by individual influences driven by society and peer groups. As associated changes occur in social behaviour, the methodological case of learners and their educational needs also change. Digital components support individuality and are simultaneously becoming increasingly important. Similar to the case of online mail order, the proximity of the offer also plays a largely subordinate role in this case. As the distance from the learner increases, the proportion of digitally depicted elements and processes increases, which is an important point for education providers, be it universities, schools, libraries or private further education companies. However, in the absence of local providers, the competitive situation may be intensified, particularly at local or regional borders. This is shown in exaggerated form in the following three hypotheses:

Obviously, the necessary research would have to address the greater integration of (A) spatial ideas about cooperation in the context of digitalisation and (B) the development of new visions and models based on this, including all domains involving the creation of knowledge and its dissemination into society.

#### *12.5.3 Methodological Critique and Future Research Needs*

Finally, it is necessary to briefly present a methodological critique of the presented research, and to address the need for future research. Due to the multi-perspectives and the high dynamics of the (socio-)technological development around digitalisation and the variety in its adoption (cf. Fischer 2012), there are certainly inaccuracies in the scientific findings, both in theoretical and methodological terms, which must be discussed briefly in the following.

#### I. *Dynamics of the research domain*:

As argued byMeusburger et al. (2011), research has to take into account the historicity of the artefact under investigation. This means that certain elements or configurations are no longer existent, and thus the research object is not always consistent in itself. Due to a learner potentially changing into a teacher or provider of an educational offer via social media channels, open platforms or research networks, it can be assumed that digitalisation will blur the boundaries between decentralised and central functional spaces.

#### II. *Development and dissemination of new knowledge*:

Overall, the influence of digitalisation on knowledge genesis in the context of sustainable, fair development should not be underestimated—and is relevant for achieving strategic development goals (SDGs; Weith and Köhler 2019). The focus here is on the development and dissemination of new knowledge and the exchange of knowledge (www.futureearth.org). Supporting a transformation towards sustainability is mentioned there as an explicit goal. The associated research agenda states that this also necessitates a new form of knowledge generation across disciplinary boundaries—together with social partners.

#### **References**

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# **Chapter 13 Transcending the Loading Dock Paradigm—Rethinking Science-Practice Transfer and Implementation in Sustainable Land Management**

#### **Sebastian Rogga**

**Abstract** Modern science is increasingly called on to produce societally relevant and usable knowledge to tackle global challenges. Academics respond by conducting research projects that transcend the boundaries of single disciplines and institutions by actively engaging with non-academic actors. Such institutional arrangements open up entirely new perspectives for science communication and the problem-solving of real-world issues. However, they also call for elaborate management tasks and demand learning processes on the part of all those involved. This chapter introduces transfer and implementation (T&I) as a conceptual pair of terms to grasp the challenges, without compromising the opportunities of this new research mode. In doing so, this chapter discusses contemporary approaches of science knowledge transfer, and promotes a notion that prioritises knowledge transfer over information transfer through artefacts. After reframing T&I as a management area in research projects, I present three strategic policy pathways for sustainable land management.

**Keywords** Transfer · Implementation · Science-practice collaboration · Transdisciplinarity · Sustainable land management · Societal impact · Conceptual framework · Strategy

## **13.1 Introduction**

After the discovery of the "ozone hole", it took policymakers five years to adopt effective measures to reduce ozone-depleting substances induced by humans on a global scale. What appears to be a long haul is actually a spectacularly short time scale if the cause of the discovery—a scientific study by Joe Farman et al. published in Nature magazine in May 1985—is placed in relation to the action—a global ban on the production of ozone-depleting substances in June 1990. In fact, the Farman report is a rare, yet outstanding example of scientific knowledge being transferred

S. Rogga (B)

Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research, Eberswalder Str. 84, 15374 Müncheberg, Germany e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
directly to society, i.e. scientific evidence that led to concrete action being taken by decision makers in line with the authors of the study.

The case of the ozone layer is often cited when addressing the potential societal impact induced by research. The science-practice transfer, which appears as a straight path in our example, is rather diffuse and acts in a permeable environment at the intersection of science and society in which information is shared, reassembled and re-evaluated. What appears to be an action arena that is too complex to steer, or even to fully understand, is an upcoming field of investigation for scientific action that aspires to bring about societal effects as a result of the research undertaken. To be clear from the outset: science-to-practice transfer cannot be conducted and planned to the full extent. This is especially true for contested policy arenas, within areas of high scientific uncertainty, and areas of application involving a variety of actors. It is nonetheless possible to design science-policy interfaces that increase the likelihood of science results being adopted by societal actors. But how should such interfaces be designed in the field of sustainable research?

In this chapter, I seek to reframe the science-society interface in sustainable land management (SLM). The result is not a "how-to manual", but rather a framework for initiating and guiding SLM processes with a focus on the transfer of knowledge. SLM encompasses a purposeful process of managing land use and development by integrating scientific and practical knowledge. From my perspective, SLM embraces project-based research processes in which actors from practice and academia form a project consortium for a certain period with the common goal of achieving the more sustainable use of land resources. As such, SLM project partners form an alliance that proactively seeks to intervene in the highly regulated field of land use. I refer to these proactive intervention measures as **transfer and implementation** (T&I), despite a variety of related terms, including diffusion, impact or outreach.

T&I is applied in a wide variety of contexts such as political science, information technology and other domains. Nevertheless, this chapter will show that T&I, as a conceptual pair of terms, is ideal for supporting the framework for that particular area of SLM practice that receives greater attention as research is increasingly asked to "perform" with a higher societal impact. Besides the societal performance aspect, I also apply T&I as *guiding principles* for transdisciplinary processes. In doing so, I take into account the fact that T&I activities in SLM encompass more than a sole compilation of artefacts (i.e. books, reports and software) that are gathered and compiled at the end of a project cycle. Thus, I seek to transcend the prevalent practice that Cash (2006) calls the "loading dock paradigm" of transfer.

The "loading dock" is a metaphor for a location or deposit where scientific results are stored for the one-way transfer of results from science to other areas of society. These results, often peppered with scientific jargon and offering limited opportunity for feedback, are indeed generally available to everybody (unless they are hidden behind paywalls), but do not specifically address non-scientific target audiences. In addition, the "loading dock" oversimplifies the complex intersectional network that emerges in the transition area between science and society, which leads to a linear, causal understanding of how knowledge transfer actually works (ibid.).

Even though the knowledge base about the question of "how to transfer knowledge" is growing annually, the "loading dock approach" is still pervasive in many academic areas. However, I consider it to be outdated for the purposes of research on sustainability issues, which places communication and social learning in the centre of research activities (Fazey et al. 2013).

Clearly, the discussion on transfer and implementation is played out against the background of a new understanding of a reflexive, engaged and process-minded form of science that faces unknown challenges and seeks to gather new forms of knowledge. Thus, in Sect. 13.2, I briefly describe this new mode of science and how it differs from other (more conventional) approaches. Against that backdrop, I argue in Sect. 13.3 how transfer and implementation can be understood in transdisciplinary science approaches in contrast to prevailing transfer models. In Sect. 13.4, I present a T&I framework for transdisciplinary research projects, and apply this framework to SLM in Sect. 13.5.

## **13.2 Science, Society and the Drive Towards Transformation**

New demands have recently been placed on science as an institution. Science is increasingly called on to serve society and justify the resources invested in it ("return on investment"). Academia is to make a greater contribution to solving *real-world issues* that society expects from science. These real-world issues, such as climate change and demographic change, differ from conventional scientific questions. They entail normative dimensions (i.e. human values, norms and preferences); they are complex (i.e. factors influencing the systems under investigation are manifold and sometimes unknown); they must be solved within democratically legitimised processes; and they call for a synthesised approach that incorporates the knowledge of many perspectives. Consequently, this new mode of science is asked to "produce" different forms of knowledge (Pohl and Hirsch-Hadorn 2006; Zscheischler et al. 2017), namely:

Whereas the production of *systems knowledge* may be provided by established research methods, the production of *target knowledge* and *transformative knowledge* calls for entirely new methods that incorporate multiple scientific disciplines as well as so-called practitioners or stakeholders.1 This novel mode of science (often

1For easier understanding, I refer in this text to "practitioners" as non-academic project partners (i.e. they represent non-academic institutions, but are contractually bound to the project consortium)

referred to as "transdisciplinary research", "transformative science" or "intervention science") seeks to change the current (non-sustainable) state of our societies by different means (and intervention levels), backed up by scientific evidence.

Not only is it necessary to generate new sets of knowledge that—unlike disciplinary knowledge—are "different" and are fed from society to science. It is also necessary to adequately communicate and feed back knowledge, and vice versa, if it is to be effective. This is at least the inherent claim of many sustainability-oriented research activities (cf. Jong et al. 2016).

From a systems theory perspective, the trend towards transdisciplinary science can be summarised as follows: The boundaries between the scientific subsystem and the other subsystems of society become more permeable. At the intersections of these subsystems, new intra- and inter-directional communication patterns are established that work bi-directionally. Transdisciplinary research projects can be located at these intersections. They form boundary organisations (Guston 2001) in which knowledge is produced and transferred to multiple subsystems such as science, politics, economy and administration.

If we continue the notion that transdisciplinary research is accompanied by new patterns of communication, then it follows that research outputs change as well since they reflect the changing mode of communication. Modern science, as it has evolved since the nineteenth century, has developed elaborated media channels for communicating within its own system boundaries. However, these communication channels may have changed in the digitised world, yet the supposed output of science has remained the same: the production of truth. As the outcomes of sustainability research change, so does the adaptation of what science has previously considered the output of a research project. Thus, concrete questions arise for the areas of T&I in the context of changing research, since T&I forms the bridge between "output" and "outcome".

## **13.3 From the "Loading Dock" to Reflexive Discourses—A Short Anthology of T&I as Objects of Scientific Investigation**

The term **implementation** is used primarily in the fields of computer science, data processing and, most prominently, in the fields of politics and administration (Nohlen 1998). In the innovation context, implementation refers to the phase in which innovation has reached "market maturity" and is distributed to anticipated customer groups accordingly (cf. Ibert 2003). This applies in modified form to non-economically exploitable innovations, too. The innovation will be linked to certain goals, but these may have unintended consequences.

and "stakeholders" when I mention actors or actor groups affected by the issue under investigation. Stakeholders may become part of the research process (via participatory methods, public hearings, exhibitions, etc.), but are not bound to the project by contract.

Despite a variety of usage contexts, **transfer** can be defined as a "transmission" of information or objects between a sender and a receiver, some of which operate in specific contexts. In application-oriented research, transfer is conventionally equated with the transfer of research results to potential users. In this context, transfer becomes an instrument that appears in the context of innovation and diffusion research (Schröder et al. 2011).

In applied science, aspects of T&I have been the focus of numerous empirical studies on the diffusion of innovations since the 1920s and 1930s. Since then, mainly application-related disciplines, such as engineering and technical sciences, medicine and geography have addressed questions relating to T&I research. The aims of research activities include the systematic analysis of transfer conditions and modelling approaches (Gräsel et al. 2006: 479).

From the perspective of research on T&I, different approaches have been developed. Of particular note here are *actor-centred approaches,* which operate with a typology of persons (groups) in the diffusion process. According to these approaches, innovations by persons or groups of people are adapted at different speeds (Hägerstrand 1952; Rogers 1995). Another approach, based on the findings of the *network theory,* considers actors as objects in a superordinate social network whose connections are of central importance (see, for example, Granovetter 1973).

A third model that has been widely adapted in German innovation policy (Blümel 2016) is the *linear model of technology push or science push* (based on Bush (1945)). According to this model, innovations go through a gradual evolution that ranges from basic research, through applied research, to product development and innovation. This model is also based on unidirectional knowledge transfer, which understands "society" as the addressee of scientific results.