Innovation Districts in the Transformation of Post-Coal Regions

Beschreibung

Innovation Districts in the Transformation of Post-Coal Regions – DOWNLOAD

The volume examines the conditions shaping the development of post-coal regions undergoing transition away from coal mining and coal-based energy production. The author critically examines the limitations of approaches that equate regional transformation primarily with the achievement of climate neutrality. Decarbonisation, while essential to the transition process, does not in itself generate employment, build regional innovation capacity, or establish sustainable and enduring economic functions. The analysis therefore centres on the concept of the innovation district as a place-based mechanism capable of integrating the adaptive reuse of land and infrastructure with institutional collaboration, the development of new economic activities, skills transformation, community participation, and processes of collective learning. Rather than presenting innovation districts as a universal prescription for post-coal transformation, the monograph identifies the institutional, economic, spatial and social conditions under which they can connect decarbonisation with the emergence of a new, socially legitimate and economically sustainable development trajectory for post-coal regions.