Interaction and management of universities mechanism in the ecosystem of the region’s sustainable development

Introduction: sustainable development is becoming a priority of state regional policy. Universities are significant actors in the socio-economic system of the region, but to date they are not sufficiently involved in solving the problems of the region’s sustainable development. The regions lack methodological approaches to managing higher education for sustainable regional development. Objectives: to develop a mechanism for interaction and regional system of universities management to ensure the region’s sustainable development. Methods: systematization, generalization, conceptual modeling. Results: the article justifies the ecosystem approach application in the context of the region’s sustainable development, presents a conceptual model of the ecosystem and outlines the special role of universities in it. A model for assessing the operation level of regional system of universities and the relationship with the region’s sustainable development is described. This assessment produces the basis for the region’s typology to select methods and tools for influencing the regional system of universities. The organizational and economic mechanism developed by the author combines the management mechanism (state influence of a vertical type) and the interaction mechanism (interaction of equal subjects (actors) in the ecosystem). Conclusions: it is assumed that the use of the proposed mechanism will contribute to improving the operational level of universities and to achieving the goals of the region’s sustainable development.