The new university’s guiding principle is to seek synergies and a new competitive advantage at the interface of technology, economics and the arts. There are many universities in the world that bring economics and engineering together under one roof, but it is rare that the arts are included.
The recent book Aalto. The Birth of the University describes how the new Finnish university came to life. The book features interviews with nearly 100 key figures, including former prime ministers and other ministers, business leaders, professors, alums, students and even fierce opponents of the project, who shed light on the unique social process from their own perspectives.
The aim of the book has been to make visible the extraordinary administrative-political-social process that led to the creation of Aalto University and that contributed to the great university reform of 2010 in Finland.
