Ata Allah Rafiei Atani’s scientific contributions

In recent years, the role of universities in the development of societies has increased. In Iran, as in other countries, universities have made changes to their programs, but it still seems they need some new policies to strengthen the impact of universities on the development of society. While explaining the reasons for the formation of existing universities at the international level, this article attempts to use the framework of Sadra's philosophy to present a new type of university called “wisdom-oriented” university. This university activates the four functions as follows: Graduate education, Development of technology and technical knowledge, Problem-solving and communicating with society (such as industry, government institutions, etc.), and Producing and disseminating of knowledge content. If the wisdom-based university is formed and institutionalized, the following characteristics could be expected: “Avoidance of particularity”, “attention to comprehensiveness and gradual shift to specialization”, “scientific moderation and attention to wisdom”, “fostering creativity, production and accumulation of knowledge content”, “duty-oriented interaction with society”, “unbounded activity”, “continuous effort to come closer to God” and “optimal use of science and technology.”

This study introduces and applies the Fitrah Tendencies framework to make up for the dearth of studies on academics’ urges to play a part in industry. To this end, 62 academics were selected and interviewed based on Lam’s (2011) typology as to come up with their main motives for engaging in industry. As per the results, new dimensions including the need for fully understanding God, the desire for doing good deeds, and the freedom felt in the economic environment were added to the previously reported factors.