Pre-announcement 4th HERA Joint Research Programme “Public Spaces: Culture and Integration in Europe” (HERA JRP PS)

The Humanities in the European Research Area (HERA) Network is planning to implement a new Joint Research Programme under the theme “Public Spaces: Culture and Integration in Europe” (HERA JRP PS). This programme will be implemented and funded by 24 humanities funding organisations with the support of the European Union and is subject to the signature of the Grant Agreement with the European Commission for co-funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme.

The expected publication date of the Call for Proposals for this HERA Joint Research Programme is 24 August 2017, with the deadline for submitting Outline Proposals on 24 October 2017. Please note that these dates may still be subject to changes. The publication of the call will be announced primarily via the website and https://twitter.com/HERA_Research.

The aim of the HERA JRP “Public Spaces: Culture and Integration in Europe” will be to deepen the theoretical and empirical cultural understanding of public spaces in a European context. The programme has been designed to facilitate a broad range of cultural approaches to conceptualising public space, its structural and processual formations, and its possible outcomes in terms of, for example, integration, exclusion, disintegration, fragmentation, hybridization, amalgamation or transmission. More provisional information about the theme and scope of this call is available below.

The HERA JRP PS Call for Proposals is being prepared by humanities-funding agencies in 24 participating countries and the European Commission. The total budget of the HERA JRP will amount up to 20 M€.

Who can apply?

Eligible scholars located in the HERA JRP PS countries: Austria, Belgium (Wallonia), Czech Republic, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom, irrespective of their nationality. Further details on the funding agencies involved in this call can be found here

Collaborative Research Projects (CRP) proposals can be submitted by balanced consortia involving four or more Principal Investigators based in four or more different HERA JRP PS countries. Applicants are strongly encouraged to take equality and diversity dimension issues into consideration. All research teams will be urged to include non-academic stakeholders as associate partners in their consortiums and they will be required to include an impact section in their application, specifying how their research results will be valorised and communicated to a wider public.

Each CRP consortium can apply for research funding up to a maximum amount of 1 M€. Projects should be between 24 and 36 months in duration and should commence by May 2019. Proposals will be selected in a two-step process involving an independent international Review Panel. The main deliverables of the research projects will be tangible outcomes such as publications, conferences and workshops, reports, policy briefs, public events, and media appearances. Both the HERA JRP PS and the HERA network will seek to increase the impact of these outcomes by encouraging and enabling wide dissemination and knowledge exchange activities.

Further information

All information will be available on the HERA website once the HERA JRP PS Call for Proposals is published (planned 24 August 2017):

• HERA JRP PS Call for Proposals, including national eligibility requirements and detailed guidelines for preparing and submitting an Outline Proposal;
• Knowledge Exchange guidance;
• FAQs and Glossary;
• Application templates.

A HERA partner search tool has been made available by NCN at: https://ncn.gov.pl/partners/hera/

For more information on the themes and scope of the HERA JRP PS call click here

What should I do now?

1. Develop a research idea.
2. Work with your colleagues in the research community to build a project consortium involving researchers in at least four different participating countries.
3. Go to the partner search facility https://ncn.gov.pl/partners/hera/ and announce that you are looking to partner with others on the research topic of your interest (but within the scope of HERA JRP PS Call Topics
4. Decide whether you would like to be project coordinator or participant in a project.
5. Review the Outline Proposal application form (published January 2017), and start drafting your Outline Proposal with your consortium.
6. Have a look at projects that have been successful in previous HERA JRP calls
7. Start working on the content part of your outline proposal containing a short description of the CRP (max. 2000 words) that outlines
   • What research question(s) does the CRP seek to answer?
   • In what way is the project original and/or innovative?
   • What are the objectives of the CRP?
   • By what methods will the research question(s) be tackled?
   • How are the skills of the partners complementary?
   • What is the added value in tackling your research question(s) from a European trans-national perspective?
   • How will partners work together? What management and coordination structures are proposed?
   • What is the significance of the research question(s)? How will these contribute to the “Public Spaces: Culture and Integration in Europe” theme?
   • What is the potential impact of the proposed research to both academic disciplines, and relevant stakeholders and user communities?
   • How will the CRP engage in knowledge exchange or active dissemination engaging user communities and audiences outside academia?
8. Be alert to the official announcement (expected August 24) and get ready to submit your application online.

This announcement is preliminary. Specific details might change.