The University and the Need for Bifurcation for Sustainable Futures

he urgent needed societal bifurcation towards a sustainable futurechallenges the university and the university’s knowledge production: researchand education as well as science, technology and innovation. The establishedknowledge types and its dominant epistemologies are questioned: In general,epistemologies which are and have always been interlaced with power, inter-ests and values need to undergo a bifurcation. At issue is what counts as legit-imate knowledge, and based on this, what counts as a reasonable structure ofthe economics system and as societally desirable technology. Required is anew spirit and mindset, combined with inter- and intragenerative awareness,justice and virtues for a new future-oriented culture of being and becominghuman. In this chapter, we discuss the context and the background for a newspirit and mindset of the university that enables critical thinking about techno-capitalist (infra-)structure, framing and thinking (dispositif). We face optionson how to re-imagine the sustainable (autonomous) university and which roleopen-source and low-tech approaches can play. The main idea is to developappropriate tools for fostering institutional bifurcations. The vision sketched inthis chapter is a university of ethical, participatory and inter- and transdiscipli-nary practice organised around critical-reflexive thinking, eudaimonistic eth-ics, broader participation, and contributory research. The university’s practicefosters sense-making and purpose-creation for sustainable development in adeliberative way. We explore the epistemological bifurcation which can beconsidered as a core element of the envisioned responsible university. We clar-ify the inherent relation of bifurcation and epistemology, and we reveal thatthe capitalist system is based on a specific (positivist) epistēmē. We problem-atise this type of epistemology, reflect options for new values and show per-spective and prospects: The university can become a bifurcation lab for a sus-tainable development of society at large.