Enhancing Social Scientific Research in Kosovo and its Integration into the European Research Area

ESSIe focused on the priority sector “social sciences” as stipulated in the National Research Programme of Kosovo 2010-2015 (NRP). It contributed to the upgrading of social scientific knowledge in support of the socio-economic development of Kosovo.

Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) constitute the majority of scientific work in Kosovo, which strongly correlates to the educational demand in the tertiary sector which is dominated by strong SSH disciplines such as law, economics, political sciences etc. In pure research terms, however, social scientific research lacks far behind its given volume in terms of tertiary education.

The main activities and results were:

1. establishing of an empirical social sciences laboratory at the ISSH resulting in 15 work stations equipped with statistical and text analysis programmes;
2. preparing and implementing a ‘Training Programme for International Social Scientific Research Qualifications’ resulting in 30 younger Kosovan researchers and 5 additionally users of social-scientific evidence trained in state-of-art scientific methodology and in scientific management;
3. establishing an international mentorship programme for 10 younger Kosovan social scientists, which results in 10 mentor-mentee agreements focusing on the production and supervision of in total more than 5 social-scientific articles by Kosovan researchers (eventually in co-publication with Austrian colleagues) published in international journals or other scientific publications;
4. organisation of a large public “Horizon 2020” conference attended by 100 participants to get first hand international information about Europe’s largest RTDI programme commencing in 2014;
5. implementing an international scientific workshop on “The social fabric of Kosovo- new research findings to evidence-base and enhance the political and socio-economic discourse about Kosovo” resulting in an increased international perception of social-sciences in Kosovo and an exchange forum between producers of social-scientific evidence and its users.

Within three of the five core activities of ESSIe, namely the ‘Training Programme for International Social Scientific Research Qualifications’ (R&D4SSR), the International Mentoring Programme and the international workshop on “The social fabric of Kosovo – new research findings to evidence-base and enhance the political and socio-economic discourse about Kosovo” the following key social scientific thematic areas were particularly considered and addressed:

-          labour market research,

-          social welfare research (incl. inclusion, migration and integration),

-          science/technology/society studies including social innovation,

-          gender research,

-          political participation and governance.

The activities were organised in 5 Work Packages:

WP1 – Preparation of the research training course “TrainingProgramme for International Social Scientific Research qualifications” (R&D4SSR)

WP2 – Implementation of R&D4SSR

WP3 – Launching “Horizon 2020” in Kosovo

WP4 – Establishment and implementation of the International Mentoring Programme

WP5 – Project Management

Mitarbeiter/innen:

• Magª. Johanna Scheck
• Mag. Dr. Klaus Schuch

Bereich: Forschungspolitik & Entwicklung

Tags: education, social sciences, Southeast Europe