FUTURES

* The world in 2025 – Rising Asia and socio-ecological transition (816KB PDF icon)
Brussels, 2009, EUR 23921 EN, ISBN 978-92-79-12485-3, ISSN 1018-5593, DOI 10.2777/2539, 28 pages

Recent developments in the world and the strong European commitment to a regulating globalisation argue in favour of a forward looking analysis. “The World in 2025” first underlines the major future trends: geopolitical transformations in terms of population, economic development, international trade and poverty. Secondly, it identifies the likely tensions: natural resources (food, energy, water and minerals), migrations or urbanisation. Finally, it defines possible transitional pathways: towards a new production and consumption model, towards new rural-urban dynamics, towards a new gender and intergenerational balance. “Rising Asia and socio-ecological transition” is the explicit sub-title that could be an inspiring source for the future strategy of the European Union.

* The World in 2025 – Contributions from an expert group (7.40 MB PDF icon)
Brussels, 2009, EUR 23864, ISBN 978-92-79-11482-3, DOI 10.2777/41493, 390 pages

The European expert group on "The World in 2025" has developed a prospective analysis based on the current state of the world and its historical evolution, including economic and societal changes and new geopolitical configurations.

This prospective exercise incorporates the demographic, economic, trade, financial, environmental, technological and social dimensions as well as the issues of migration, security and governance.

"The World in 2025" contains the contribution of the individual experts as well as scenarios outlining future developments over the next fifteen years.

* METRIS Report – Emerging Trends in Socio-economic Sciences and Humanities in Europe (1.8 MB PDF icon)
Brussels, 2009, EUR 23741, ISBN 978-92-79-11136-5, DOI 10.2777/57083, 144 pages
METRIS stands for Monitoring European Trends in Social Sciences and Humanities. The aim of METRIS is to support the European Research Area (ERA) in the Social Sciences and the Humanities (SSH). This is particularly important for these sciences, because their knowledge is embedded into national systems, and the ERA brings about novel insights and perspectives that result from comparing national systems and situations as well as rising above such comparisons. European level research in SSH forms an important support for European policy-making.

This first report from a METRIS expert group identifies important new and emerging trends in social sciences and humanities in the 5 themes of the framework programme:
o Growth, employment and competitiveness in a knowledge-based society;
o Combining economic, social and environmental objectives;
o Major trends in society and their implications;
o Europe and the world;
o The citizen in Europe.

In addition the report highlights some themes that cut across these areas (such as migration for example) as well as some examples of cutting edge research that lie outside the thematic coverage of the Framework Programme, such as new conceptualizations of space, the rise of visual and affective themes in social sciences and themes that arise from the breaking down of the boundaries between the sciences.

It is envisaged that the reflection of expert groups will be combined with a sound monitoring system to form a powerful supporting instrument for the advancement of the ERA in SSH. It will provide for a collective understanding of the state of the art, trends, needs, challenges and research policies for SSH across Europe and in all its Member Countries, and will thus support the advancement of SSH in Europe through coordinated research efforts and coordinated research policy interventions.




* Report on the seminar "Anthropological perspectives in a changing Europe - Bringing people in", which took place in Florence 23-24 October 2008. (1.11MB PDF icon)
Brussels, 2009, EUR 24160, ISBN 978-92-79-13622-1, ISSN 1018-5593, doi 10.2777/53840

An initiative of the Director of the "Science, Economy and Society Directorate", Jean-Michel Baer, this seminar was organised both to encourage the participation of humanities scholars in the SSH Work Programme and to contribute to the Directorate’s preparation of its 2012-2013 road map. 18 anthropologists from Europe and beyond participated in discussion on the specific contribution the discipline can make to the programme.
Presentation by anthropologists such as Michael Herzfeld from Harvard University, Marc Abélès from the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, and Christina Garsten from the University of Sweden, were followed by discussions around the following questions:
o What is the current state of anthropological research on Europe and Europeans?
o How can anthropology help us to understand how abstract notions of "Europe", "European" and "European citizenship" are enacted and embodied by individuals in their everyday lives?
o How can anthropology shed light on the way individuals in Europe experience and react to globalisation?

* The European Foresight Monitoring Network, Collection of EFMN Briefs - Part 1 (5.7MBPDF icon)
EUR 23095 EN, 2008, 481 pp. - ISBN 978-92-79-07448-6

Foresight identifies future research and innovation priorities going within and beyond the Lisbon strategy and contributes to building a strong European Research Area. It helps in the early identification of emerging issues that could have far-reaching implications for European Science and Technology in the long run. It contributes to the analysis of changes in the global research system and their possible implications for European research policy. The Foresight Monitoring Network (EFMN) is a Europe-wide network inspired and financed by the European Commission in the framework of the Foresight Knowledge Sharing Platform implemented under the Research Framework Programme. The EFMN initiative identifies the big scientific, technological and social challenges of tomorrow, contributing thus to the main priorities of the socio-economic sciences and humanities research.
Through a continuous monitoring and mapping of ongoing and emerging Foresight activities conducted not only in Europe, but also in other regions of the world, the EFMN project identifies “hot topics” noteworthy for their novelty or importance and contributes to the dissemination of this relevant information through the production of short foresight policy briefs. It covers countries as varied as the EU Member States, Japan, China and Korea, the US, Canada and Brazil. Those briefs that were written between 2004 and 2007 summarize the results of recently terminated or on-going foresight activities dealing with crucial topics such as the hydrogen economy, the knowledge-based development of rural economies or the sustainable exploitation of marine resources.