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Policies for Smart Specialisation

Project description

Strengthening innovation in Europe’s regions

Smart specialisation is an essential principle of European regional policies, aimed at increasing efficiency in research and innovation investments. This region-based approach aims to boost growth and jobs by enabling each region to identify and develop its own competitive advantages. Over 120 smart specialisation strategies have been developed. The EU-funded POLISS project will address the gaps between the conceptualisation, design and implementation of smart specialisation strategies. Bringing together 8 leading European academic institutions and 14 partners from local governments, development agencies, international organisations, research institutes and private companies, the project will take a multidisciplinary approach. It will provide new systematic evidence and methodological tools to scholars, policymakers and local practitioners for designing smart specialisation actions.

Objective

Smart Specialisation is a successful innovation policy concept which has become a cornerstone of the European cohesion policy and also addresses several of the Sustainable Development Goals.
However, the early implementation of SmartSpec policies has raised concerns among scholars and policy makers, who have pointed to a number of gaps in its conceptualisation, design and implementation. POLISS (“Policies for Smart Specialisation”) will tackle these gaps with the aim of making the design, implementation and evaluation of Smart Spec policies more effective in Europe.
POLISS is a joint collaboration of 8 leading European academic institutions and 14 partners spanning local governments, development agencies, international organizations, research institutes and private companies. POLISS brings together a diverse set of actors from all the fields contributing to SmartSpec; therefore it adopts a multidisciplinary approach by integrating their insights and knowledge. Building on their expertise and everyday engagement with SmartSpec policies, POLISS aims at: a) providing new systematic evidence and methodological tools to scholars, policy makers and local practitioners for designing and assessing SmartSpec actions in EU regions and beyond; b) building a PhD programme where a new generation of experts in regional development and innovation policy will be trained and once graduated will be possibly employed in regional, national and European private or public organisations that work on regional development and innovation; c) providing a forum for coordinating the vast community of researchers and practitioners working on local development and innovation, which is often sparse and fragmented.

Coordinator

UNIVERSITEIT UTRECHT
Net EU contribution
€ 796 859,64
Address
HEIDELBERGLAAN 8
3584 CS Utrecht
Netherlands

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Region
West-Nederland Utrecht Utrecht
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
Links
Total cost
€ 796 859,64

Participants (7)