Exploring universities' transformative potential for sustainability-bound learning in changing landscapes of knowledge communication

ln processes of sustainability communication, the communicative interplay between the individual citizen and society, inseparably linked to intermediary levels of mutual mediation and reconciliation, is essential. Since attaining a sustainable society without societal communication about sustainability would seem to be impossible, the design of communicative interfaces between science, politics and the public is of particular significance. As a consequence, this paper aims to highlight meaning, role and interdependencies of sustainability-oriented knowledge communication against the backdrop of universities' education, research, and innovation activities. These approaches do not only allow for deepened analyses and substantial optimization of stored knowledge but, furthermore, also highlight opportunities for various contexts of sustainability-oriented governance -above and beyond higher education. Subsequently, these approaches are critiqued within the context of knowledge communication and analysed in the light of the contrasting "internal rationalities" of science and politics. In doing so, trends in medialization in both domains are taken as much into account as participative practices for including non-scientific actors in political decision-making. As a result, various dimensions of a dialogically-reflexive communication are proposed against the backdrop of future societal pathways towards sustainability, reflecting the diversity, dynamics and self-organization - all featuring the liaison between science and politics on an organizational basis. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.