two metropolitan FM regions can be useful in understanding beneficial and disadvantageous relationships between the values and structures of, and in FMs, and specifically in examining institutional impediments such as governance. Thus we illustrate the possibilities and limitations of values for and within metropolitan FMs.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union, higher education (HE) in post-Soviet reality continues to face complex challenges, including hierarchical structures, antiquated teaching methods, and lack of international standards. In the meantime, in the US and in Europe, HE has recently focused on participatory curriculum development (PCD) and programs that seek to directly connect student learning to “real-world” problems, accelerating positive change in curricula and through their contributions to regional communities. Accepted into the Bologna Process—the standardization of European HE—Armenian HE institutions struggle to satisfy requirements and related sustainable development goals with centralized standards, inhibiting them from being internationally competitive and regional sustainability change agents. In this article, we examine post-Soviet HE development since 1991 and challenges, with a particular focus on Armenia; what participatory curriculum building may offer; and how it contributes to HE and regional sustainability transitions. A systematic literature review was applied, using specific combinations of important terms restricting the search with criteria such as language, year of publication, and descriptive or critical in nature. The results illustrate the status quo of post-Soviet HE, synthesize current barriers of HE as potential change agents, and highlight PCD as a way to overcome these barriers.

In this paper we evaluate whether the course “System Analysis and Scenario Technique” at BOKU University can equip students with the necessary competencies to perform transdisciplinary research to foster the integration of science, technology, policy and practice. Furthermore, we investigate what the most effective didactic methods applied in the course are, and whether the course qualifies as transdisciplinary pedagogy. The course follows the simplified framework of a transdisciplinary case study and tries to transfer such an approach into the traditional curricula of Master programs. An online survey among former participants of the course was conducted. Results for the years 2015/16 and 2016/17 indicate that the course indeed has potential to increase transdisciplinary competencies among participants and could therefore qualify as transdisciplinary pedagogy. Students expressed that work with real-world cases and stakeholders from outside the university was the most effective didactic method. However, the study also showed that there were limits in integrating real-world cases within the course. Students complained about the high workload and time constraints. Short-term solutions might include optimizing case selection and student guidance. Long-term solutions beg for a reorganization of traditional Austrian curricula that would allow for the appropriate arrangement of the course with other classes. These results highlight some of the advantages, but also drawbacks of moving transdisciplinary education outside of standard curricula.

This paper presents an empirically grounded investigation of the values and practices of farmers markets (FM) in Vienna, Austria and their linkages to wider alternative food practices of ecological, social and economic sustainability. If the FMs are to play a vibrant role in the Viennese alternative food system, enhancing urban–rural connections and urban resilience, they must re–align their values to this system. A values-based conceptual framework is used to examine the structures and functions of six Viennese FMs and the alignment of values and practices among FM managers, farmers/vendors and consumers. Data from qualitative interviews, participant observation and dot surveys were collected at each FM. Value alignment is discovered as necessary to support and perpetuate alternative values. Governance is found to be significant for aligning values related to FM sustainability. Current structures and functions of Viennese FMs cannot be easily aligned with participant values and practices. As one of the first examinations of Viennese FMs, this work illustrates concrete challenges, priorities and emphasizes the role that governance and social organizing plays in successful markets as contributors towards sustainable urban food systems. Lessons learned can be applied to municipal FMs and other food system actors that face similar challenges.

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