Ass. Professor, PhD

The increasing role of health promotion and prevention in all industrialized countries has caused increasing focus on local communities and local governance because participation and empowerment are vital factors behind succesful health promotion and prevention. When Denmark in 2007 launched a radical reform of municipal and regional government health issues were in the centre of the attention of the reform-makers. The number of municipalities was reduced with more than 50%,  and a major objective was to create large municipalities with more competence and able to tacke complicated issues of promotion and prevention, including organizational and staff capacities for utilization of research. Along with that various reforms in the university system are motivating and reorienting universities towards more cooperration with external partners from the public and private sector. This paper is analyzing critically the preparation, planning and first phase of implementation of an ambitious initiative between the health promotion research at the University of Southern Denmark and municipalities. The contribution has as its point of departure the expeiences so far by launching jointly financed  and managed PhD scholarships but includes other connected links of cooperation in research and teaching. The emirical material consists of official and semi-official materials and interviews with inside actors. The purpose of the contruibution is to point to  possible trends andhampering as well as promoting factors of more general nature by including experiences from  innovation theory and organizational learning.