European Universities’ Discourse on SDGs in Social Networks

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development has become an increasing focus of activities in universities, particularly affecting research and education and integrating the SDGs into the curricular schedule. Universities can contribute to the SDGs not only through education and research but also by boosting public participation in addressing SDGs and promoting cross-sectoral dialogue through social networks, since they are now considered essential communication tools to interact and build relationships with stakeholders. In this chapter, we apply big data techniques to analyze universities’ messages related to SDGs on Twitter to demonstrate how the content of these messages influences stakeholders’ engagement. Using a large sample of recent tweets from European universities, we draw conclusions that shed light on universities’ impact when disseminating information about SDGs.