After successful completion of the course, students are able to

• recognise the opportunities and new fields of action as well as the challenges that digital change offers for communities and regions
• assess how the megatrend of digitalisation is changing the scope of action of communities and regions and their inhabitants and businesses
• assess the impact of digitalisation on different types of space, in particular on the attractiveness of rural areas as well as urban and metropolitan areas
• provide an overview of the activities of (Austrian) regions and municipalities in order to take advantage of the opportunities offered by digitalisation and avoid undesirable effects
• share knowledge about digital tools that are already available to communities and regions
• develop ideas and proposals for digital tools which communities and regions can use to master current issues and tasks such as quality of life, demographic and social change, services of general interest, local supply, mobility, education, care, jobs, urbanisation, climate change adaptation and conservation of resources.

Digitalisation has been a major issue for many years. And especially since the Corona lockdown, this topic is more present than ever before. Some see it positively as the " digitalisation push of the century", others negatively as a home-office compulsion along with an unpleasant dissolution of the barrier between private and working life. And the Corona period has revealed severe disparities both socially and physically/spatially. A strong Internet connection, including all hardware and software equipment, is still far from being available everywhere as a matter of course.

In this course we will work on questions concerning "Digital Regions" with the help of expert panels:

• Do the principles of digitalisation and networking represent completely new possibilities to cross space and time?
• Will this increase or decrease the importance of regions, or can the Internet even be "regional"?
• Will regions in the future be more restricted or unlimited in socio-spatial terms (actor landscape) or will physical proximity remain as dominant as before?
• Is digitalisation the creative answer to all structural problems or are expectations exaggerated?
• How well (or badly) are communities and regions prepared for all these changes?
• Which digital tools can we give the various actors for their digital design process?
• Which digitalisation learning effects from the involuntary Corona Lockdown phase in 2020 are permanently useful – or do we actually not want any of this (again)?

• Inputs and discussion in four expert rounds (plenary)
• Desk research and individual on-site visits and interviews with users of digital tools for regions and municipalities
• Discussions about the status quo and future perspectives as well as digital utopias on special topics (e.g. mobility, energy, participation, e-governance, intercommunal aspects, utilities, communication, working and housing)
• Development of proposals for practical digital applications (toolkit for regions)
• Definition of cornerstones of a Digital Regional Agenda as a basis for the digital process of a region
• Presentation and Closing Plenary: Joint reflection on whether digitalisation processes need more than just digital tools: How does space change? Are new spaces or infrastructures created? How high must the degree of public participation be in order to be able to implement them? What attitudes do we encounter? (Scepticism and rejection are just as important as openness and curiosity.)
• Working method: group or individual work, plenary

Die LVA wird über MS Teams organisiert. Bitte aufgrund der schwer planbaren Corona-Situation unaufgefordert und selbständig die TISS- und MS Teams-News verfolgen! Die Block-Module finden als Videokonferenzen statt – Links folgen.

1) Seminar paper (30%)

• What does digitalisation mean in rural areas in comparison to urban areas?
• What does digitalisation in regions mean to you as a future planner?
• Where are the opportunities and challenges? What goals and guiding principles exist on the level of the state / federal government and the EU? And how are these implemented or promoted?

2) Digital Agenda (50%)

As a spatial planner, you are being asked by a region to advise it on digitalisation.

• Choose a relevant topic with regard to digitalisation processes (e.g. mobility, energy, administration, utilities or communication etc.).
• Choose a region for which you show or discuss existing activities and future opportunities and challenges through the use of digitalisation measures.
• Develop a clear digital toolkit for this region: Which products, instruments or practical implementations could be made available to the region?
• Discuss and consider an implementation process from the involvement of municipalities (and their representatives) to regional actors in business and civil society.
• Summarize the results in a project sheet.

3) Participation and presentation (20%)

Attendance and active participation at plenaries, presentation

Materials for the course will be shared via MS Teams