Stefan Kah

Stefan Kah is a Research & Knowledge Exchange Fellow at the European Policies Research Centre (EPRC), University of Strathclyde, specializing in regional policy and development in Alpine and South-Eastern Europe.

Education

• Master's Thesis: "The evolution of innovation policy in Styria: the impact of the regional innovation system concept" (2016)

His research focuses on EU Cohesion policy implementation, rural development, and landscape conservation. He has conducted field studies in the Cinque Terre National Park (Italy), Großes Walsertal Biosphere Reserve (Austria), and transnational projects across Spain, Austria, and Poland, examining how local food products catalyze regional development while preserving cultural landscapes. His work emphasizes participatory development approaches and multi-level governance in regional policy.

Recent publications analyze integrated territorial investment frameworks and the evolving role of small/medium-sized towns in European regional policy, highlighting trends toward place-based cohesion strategies and the growing recognition of medium urban centers in territorial development.

Kah serves as Research Co-investigator for the Swiss State Secretariat-funded project "Regional Policy in Europe: A Comparative Assessment" (2025-2027) and as Academic for the Core-IB INTERREG project (2025-2026), demonstrating sustained grant acquisition across European institutional partnerships focused on policy implementation evaluation.

As network manager of the IQ-Net consortium, he coordinates transnational knowledge exchange on Structural Funds implementation, facilitating collaboration between regional authorities and policymakers across Alpine and South-Eastern European contexts through structured workshops and evaluation frameworks.