Regional development and university contribution: an analysis of national and international publications the years of 2008 and 2016

Abstract

The idea of development gains strength throughout the 20th century, the recurrent distinction between growth and economic development on the historical plane makes sense from the intertwining between the increase in production and per capita income and, at the same time, profound changes in society. The development theme, with a focus beyond economic growth, relating aspects of quality of life, environmental sustainability, and social and cultural equity, has been gaining prominence in discussions in the area of social sciences. The search for democratically qualified societies, acting inseparably from the collective’s exclusive interests, signals the need to develop cooperation networks, based on mutual trust and collaboration. It is worth noting the existence of regional councils in order to exercise social control, but also the representative articulation and regional development. Universities, especially public ones, also have a social commitment to regional development; by the way, universities are vectors that induce regional development, connecting with the world while taking root regionally, with effects on the production and consumption of the economy, which have a multiplying effect on spatial structures, especially in cities where are located. In this sense, the study on screen aimed to carry out a survey of publications about the participation of universities in the regional development process, from 2008 to 2016, to analyze in which optics the university contribution
to regional development has been studied. For that, we used the bibliometric analysis, performed from the
data collection on Scopus and Redalyc platforms. The results show that, although the topic has gained some
evidence in the last five years, there is still a lack of research that deeply discusses the relationship between
universities and regional development.