Fostering Sustainable Development through Shifting Toward Rural Areas and Digitalization—The Case of Romanian Universities

Maria-Floriana Popescu, Bogdan-Cristian Chiripuci, Andreea Orîndaru, Marius Constantin and Albert Scrieciu
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Maria-Floriana Popescu: Faculty of International Business and Economics, The Bucharest University of Economic Studies, 010374 Bucharest, Romania
Bogdan-Cristian Chiripuci: Faculty of Agri-Food and Environmental Economics, The Bucharest University of Economic Studies, 010374 Bucharest, Romania
Andreea Orîndaru: Faculty of Marketing, The Bucharest University of Economic Studies, 010374 Bucharest, Romania
Marius Constantin: Faculty of Agri-Food and Environmental Economics, The Bucharest University of Economic Studies, 010374 Bucharest, Romania
Albert Scrieciu: National Institute of Marine Geology and Geoecology (GeoEcoMar), 024053 Bucharest, Romania

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 10, 1-15

Abstract: Educational institutions, especially universities, have been major pillars in societal transformation throughout society’s history. They have been leading change through their discoveries, research results, and foremost, their example. Nowadays, universities have once again taken the role of leading change in a world that is profoundly determined to have a sustainable approach to life, paying attention to the long-term effects of their actions. In this sense, under the impact of deep digitalization, this paper advocates for the sustainable development of universities regarding campuses’ expansion to rural areas. Moreover, it was demonstrated that sustainable development can be achieved by embracing the potential of digitalization. Based on a multicriteria analysis of the Romanian development regions, the research results showed that the rural area might be a welcoming environment for campuses of sustainable universities, based on digitalization at the level of the rural area in all activity fields, which is an initiative that would generate positive outcomes on many levels for different types of stakeholders, such as universities, students, staff, rural area population, and the nearby business environment. Future research aims to approach and explain the compounded effects of such an approach in depth and establish an even clearer picture of how beneficial such an expansion could prove to all factors considered under a knowledge-based society with digitized information as a vital pillar.

Keywords: university; sustainable development; sustainability; rural area (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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