Integrating educational institutions to produce intellectual capital for sustainability in Caguas, Puerto Rico

This research is part of a broader investigation to analyse the processes followed by the Caguas Municipality at the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in an effort to develop the characteristics of a ‘Smart City’ as an example of sustainable development. We describe the integration of the educational institutions’ initiatives and the municipal government strategic plan to contribute to the knowledge and intellectual capital that brings sustainability to the city. An actor's model was designed to represent this integration. The conceptual framework was based on the concepts of knowledge production and sharing as applied to the collaboration between critical representative actors. Field research consisting of in-depth interviews was performed to ascertain the integration processes and their relationship with such processes of knowledge production and sharing. The results showed that the governance paradigm implemented is already empowering the citizens to contribute with intellectual capital that brings sustainability to Caguas.