The science of urban regions: Public-science-community partnerships as a new mode of regional governance?

Abstract This article offers a discussion on the opportunity of collaborative, multi-actor (public, private, science, social, and civic actors) partnerships as experimental policymaking and governance solutions for climate mitigation and adaptation plans geographically localized at the urban, metropolitan, and regional level. It sets out considerations as regards the need to design newly conceived permanent or temporary institutional geographies by building on the analysis of examples of policies implementing this kind of partnerships in Italy (e.g., river contracts; river foundations; neighborhood agreements; pacts of collaboration; city science offices; urban sustainable development and innovation partnerships, etc.). Finally, the article draws attention to the challenges entailed by these partnerships including ethics, accountability, and climate justice concerns.