Openness, Innovation, and the Reflexive University: Rethinking Knowledge Governance

This article critically examines how two originally distinct concepts – openness, rooted in transparency and democratic access, and innovation, tied to economic valorisation and competitiveness –have been aligned through policy reforms, evaluative regimes, and digital infrastructures. Drawing on neo-institutionalist theory and comparative empirical cases from Europe, China, Latin America, and Africa, it interrogates the institutional and epistemic consequences of this convergence. The analysis demonstrates how open science and innovation have been reframed as instruments of performative governance, narrowing epistemic diversity and reshaping legitimacy in the name of accountability and impact. While alternative practices and platforms offer civic and pluralist counter-models, the managerial paradigm remains structurally dominant. The article explores the entanglement of openness and innovation with broader transformations in knowledge capitalism and calls for reflexivity in knowledge governance.