Collective projects

Public institutions in Europe are increasingly challenged to find new ways to provide public value in an open, transparent way. In a growing number of small and large cities across Europe, citizens are engaged and mobilised to demonstrate their ability in creating innovative solutions for important social issues. The challenge is to capture the creativity of these local solutions and their potential opportunities, both from a social and a market perspective, including the potential for sustaining diverse and alternative economies, slow economies among them.

Tens of millions of people live in forced displacement, many of them in protracted refugee and displacement situations for long periods of time and even generations. This is often accepted, albeit reluctantly, as a semi-permanent state of affairs given that return as a solution to forced displacement rarely takes place. The situation affects life trajectories of displaced people and poses multiple challenges for social, economic, urban and environmental services and for local investments and labour markets.

At a time where the integration of refugee and migrant children into host societies is most pressing, education systems face multiple challenges due to growing cultural, linguistic and ethnic diversity and to socio-economic inequalities.

Global migration governance regimes are emerging. There is a pressing need to identify priority areas and strategies to facilitate orderly, safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility as foreseen in the Sustainable Development Goals of Agenda 2030 and the New York Declaration of 2016. The EU is involved in the global effort to design multilevel migration governance models applicable to the Union and to its Member States.

Currently not available

The Humanities in the European Research Area (HERA) Network has launched a new Joint Research Programme under the theme "Public Spaces: Culture and Integration in Europe" (HERA JRP PS).

Specific challenge

There is a need for a deeper understanding of processes that lead to organised crime and terrorist networks. This needs to be examined from a social science, psychological and economic perspective. Where appropriate, research should also take into account the potential impact of organized crime on cohesion of societies.

Specific challenge

The European Union (EU) consists of more than 500 million people across the twenty-eight countries which make up the Union. Economic growth, together with the opportunities provided by a free and democratic society based on the rule of law, generate prosperity amongst Europe's citizens who benefit from increased mobility across national borders, and from globalized communication and finance infrastructure – but with such opportunities also come risks, as terrorists and criminals seek to pursue destructive and malicious ends.