TITLE:
Good Practices of Interdisciplinary International Cooperation between Universities and Local Development on Social Suffering in Urban Spaces
AUTHORS:
Ida Castiglioni, Alberto Giasanti, Osvaldo Romero, Armando Ulloa
KEYWORDS:
Interdisciplinary Research; Social Suffering; Urban Spaces
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.2 No.1,
January
13,
2014
ABSTRACT: This article describes areas in application of good
practices which emerged from international and interdisciplinary research on
social suffering in urban spaces and on change agentry with inter-cultural sensitivity, which
is on the basis of a new concept of co-operation for local development. Three
examples of possible good practices are illustrated: 1) Pilot action-research
project by UNAN of Managua on community health and quality of life in Managua’s Barrio
Carlos Fonseca, an urban place of social suffering; 2) the relationship between
University of Sancti Spiritus and the local Cuban community; 3) the action-research on the rights of citizen that the
University of Milano-Bicocca,
together with the Foundation Casa della Carità (local NGO), is conducting in
some districts in Milan. It is important to emphasize how universities progressively
raise number of tasks making them increasingly important as agents for local development.
Therefore universities should be measured not only on the basis of quality of knowledge and human
capital, but also on the level of embedded social capital within a certain
region. Universities should increasingly become the nexus in which
people can come together, ask questions, make demands and offer experiences. These social and
professional practices pass through the university arena and return to their
origins enriched by exchanges of new perspectives. Ideas coming from places of action and from dynamic
collectivities outside, stimulate the inside through continuous
co-mingling.