Maria da Graça Carvalho participated in the breakfast briefing "European Security Research in Horizon 2020 - a Societal Challenge?" that took place today at the European Parliament.The meeting was chaired by Christian Ehler MEP.
The 7th Framework Programme with a funding of 1.4 billion Euros for security research was only a first step in enhancing coordinated and collaborative research in the field of security. For the upcoming Framework Programme for Research, discussions have started again on how to foster and integrate not only security research, but also civil security and defence research at the European level. Given the current financial crises and austerity measures in the Member States, finding synergies between the different fields of security becomes even more important. This has been underlined by the Council conclusions to actively support research synergies between for example the European Defence Agency and the European Commission. At the same time one has to re-evaluate the overall societal utility of security research.
This event discussed in particular whether security research should be perceived as a "Societal Challenge" and which consequences are emanating from that.