Gesa Pflitsch & Max-Peter Menzel (2026)
Research Policy, 55, online first

Abstract. Universities increasingly engage in sustainability transitions through Third Mission (TM) activities that confront “wicked” problems and conflicting value systems. In this paper, we develop a conceptual framework that explains how TM contributes to transformative change by placing value collisions at its analytical core. Drawing on Convention Theory, we distinguish two knowledge processes: equivalence-oriented processes that seek efficiency and alignment, and dissonance-oriented processes that deliberately engage divergent values. Crucially, we conceptualize dissonance not as a barrier but as a generative driver of transformation, making its organization a core task of transformative TM. Using this perspective, we assess which organizational forms and governance arrangements enable transformation by sustaining dissonance, identifying heterarchy and an intermediate space between academia and society as central. This delineation sets transformative universities apart from other models and yields far-reaching implications for TM-related policy mixes and impact assessment.
Extract: “To this end, we deliberately move beyond conceptual frameworks that integrate value dynamics into knowledge processes, such as learning-oriented approaches (e.g., Stam et al., 2023). Instead, we draw on Convention Theory (Boltanski and Thévenot, 2006; Diaz-Bone, 2018; Stark, 2009), which foregrounds value systems and the conflicts that arise between them. Convention Theory has been applied in domains characterized by shifting value systems (Boltanski and Chiapello, 2005; Lafaye and Thévenot, 2017; Menzel, 2023), by conflicts between competing values (Boltanski and Thévenot, 1999), or by forms of coordination that differ by their underlying values (Ponte and Sturgeon, 2014; Stark, 2009; Storper and Salais, 1997). In particular, we adopt Stark’s (2009) concept of dissonance, which conceptualizes the collision of competing value systems not as an impediment but as a generative force for innovation. We use this to conceptualize a shift toward dissonance as a central knowledge process in transformative TM, to explore how dissonance can be organized, and how its productive use may serve as a transformative driver.” (p. 2)