The University of Burgos has invited us to a conference on November the 23rd to present the opportunities of investigation and innovation that the European Commission offers to the Social and Legal Sciences and Humanities researching community through their programs, such as Horizon2020, DAPHNE, COSME, JUSTICE or ERASMUS+. Furthermore, we will also deal with the fragmentation and the transverse topics in other calls and programs.
To us, the success of this conference consists in encouraging the joint generation of new ideas and projects among the researching personnel of the Universidad de Burgos, fomenting its collaboration with other private and public agents. It is clear that this community can benefit, particularly from programs such as COSME or ERASMUS+ – which, by the way, will close in the first quarter of 2017 – but inside the Horizon2020 things have also changed for the better.
While, in the Seventh Macro Program (FP7), the investigation in Social Sciences and Humanities had its own specific program, with a restricted budget, in Horizon2020 the investigation in these areas is wholly integrated into each of the priorities of research: Excellent Science, Industrial Leadership and Societal Challenges.
Why? The strategy of the European Commission it’s based on the premise that the social and humanities areas are essential and will mean a great benefit for the society as a whole. In 2014, its integration was considered to be only very partially successful: ever since, a more significant emphasis has been made on its inclusion and on the improvement of the coordination of efforts, which is not only an opportunity for the researching community, but also for the whole European society.
Europe has laid out as an objective a bigger accent on the cross-disciplinary character, highlighting the necessity of experts on the social impact, in intellectual property rights, evaluation of experimental phases, and all tasks in which these disciplines have a lot to say in.
