In the aftermath of the recent financial crisis, many visions of European futures assign an important role to the knowledge sectors – research, higher education, technology and innovation. These sectors are often associated with potential for sustainable future growth and a better quality of life. In recent decades, European integration in knowledge policy areas has deepened and widened including funding instruments such as Framework Programmes and Structural Funds, initiatives like the European Research Area and the European Higher Education Area as well as new institutions: the European Research Council and the European Institute of Innovation and Technology.

Today, European knowledge governance has to deal with a number of long-standing contradictions and tensions over its goals, organization and distribution of power across multiple levels and actors. Major contradictions include tensions between economic and social aims, between self-organization and steering, between diversity and convergence, and between European integration and globalization. The ways these contradictions are managed will largely determine the future of European knowledge governance.

The contributors to this symposium analyze potentials, risks and mechanisms for addressing often deep-rooted and path-dependent tensions and contradictions in Europe of Knowledge. To do so, they draw on various disciplines, theoretical and methodological perspectives and empirical bases, allowing for an analysis of the major trends in multi-level knowledge governance and their implications for European futures.