High Hopes, Hard Realities: Civic Universities at the crossroads

Join us for a thought-provoking lecture at the Cordingley Theatre, Humanities Bridgeford Street Building.

Manchester alongside Newcastle, Sheffield, Leeds and Birmingham is one of the initial group of civic universities that evolved in the great Northern cities of the UK. Brian Robson linked two of these cities. He grew up and went to school in Newcastle and based his PhD on the growth of that City. He then not only went on to an illustrious academic career in Manchester University but also to lead the University’s re-engagement with its city and region

In this lecture John will update the case made in his 2009 NESTA Provocation to Reinvent the Civic University to the very different economic and political environment in which archetypal UK civic universities in core cities outside London are now operating. John will draw on the report of the Civic University Commission Truly Civic: Strengthening the connection between universities and their places and the follow-on Civic University Network.

John will suggest how the ties (and accountability) of this group of universities to their communities have been diluted because of the funding regimes and related competitive pressures driving up the need to raise national and international profiles, research reputations and attractiveness to overseas students. Indeed, the imperatives highlighted by the Civic University Commission have been working against the grain in these institutions, and as a result they have some way to go to meet their full potential as ‘truly civic’

But John conclude by recognising the policy landscape is changing with the UK Secretary of State for Education proposing (in a letter to Vice-Chancellors) that universities “Play a greater civic role in their communities”. This is a welcome formal acknowledgement by the Government of the importance of universities’ civic role and suggests that it could lead to a greater incentivisation of this in future. This is also a future in which city region Mayoral combined authorities - in the context of the forthcoming English devolution bill - could be pivotal. John suggest this will require bottom up as well as top-down change. For universities, a collaborative mindset at odds with prevailing attitudes and practices. For policy makers across Whitehall silos a clearer incentive structure to collectively support universities’ civic mission.

Going forward, John anticipate that the coincidence of multiple crises across the world and populism -which has its roots in left behind places - will have far reaching implications that universities cannot ignore. Indeed, John will argue that if they do not step up to the plate and assert their civic role as anchor institutions in their places, the very existence of some universities may be at stake.

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John is Emeritus Professor at Newcastle University UK where he founded and led the Centre for Urban and Regional Development Studies (CURDS) from 1977 – 1998 and was subsequently appointed Deputy Vice Chancellor with responsibility for city and regional engagement until his retirement in 2008. In 2009 as Visiting Fellow at NESTA he wrote the provocation Reinventing the Civic University From 2018 to 2024 he was part-time Professor of Universities and Cities in Birmingham University. His work straddles the separate academic and policy fields of city and regional development, higher education and research and innovation.

John was academic leader of the OECD programme Higher Education and Regions: Globally Competitive, Locally Engaged (2007) and drew on this in subsequent advise for the European Commission, linking services responsible for regions, for education and for research. This experience in policy and practise has informed his academic publications. The University and the City (with Paul Vallance) (2013) which looks into the university from outside. The Civic University: The Policy and Leadership Challenges (with Ellen Hazelkorn, Louise Kempton and Paul Vallance) (2016) considers how universities can best manage engagement with civil society globally and locally. Both volumes informed the work of the UK’s Civic University Commission where John acted as Vice Chair and advised on the establishment of the Civic University Network which supports over 100 UK universities and is based at Sheffield Hallam University where John is Visiting Professor and Senior Policy Advisor to the National Civic Impact Accelerator programme

John has been awarded the Victoria medal of the Royal Geographical Society, the Sir Peter Hall Award of the Regional Studies Association, elected a Fellow of the Academia Europaea. In 2012 he was awarded the Lord Dearing Lifetime Achievement Award for Higher Education Information about his forthcoming autobiography can be found here His latest blog is https://www.hepi.ac.uk/2025/08/02/weekend-reading-rethinking-the-role-of-place-in-uk-higher-education-policy/

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The Brian Robson Lecture is a biennial event named in honour of Brian Robson OBE, Emeritus Professor of Geography and Founder of Centre for Urban Policy Studies (now the Spatial Policy and Analysis Lab) at The University of Manchester, who died in June 2020.

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