process, recognizing the
European values of participation, gender equality,
and low corruption has
been powerful throughout
Europe. The key factors in
reducing inequality include
a strong focus on education,
health, social protection,
progressive taxation, higher
wages for the general workforce, stronger labor rights,
especially for women.
6
These values makes Europe
a unique place to develop
research that features
strong human and humanistic values, a strong
commitment to the U.N.
sustainability goals, and
recognizing the opportunity
for overall participation on
equal terms beyond hier-archies, knowledge levels,
education, or assets.
References
1. Brown, R. R., Deletic, A. and Wong,
T.H.F. Interdisciplinarity: How to
catalyze collaboration. Nature
525, 315–317 (Sept. 17, 2015)
doi: 10.1038/525315a
2. Ir win, A. Citizen Science: A Study of
People, Expertise and Sustainable
Development. Routledge, 2002.
3. Kemmis, S., and Mc Taggart, R.
Participatory Action Research:
Communicative Action and the Public
Sphere. Sage Publications Ltd., 2005.
4. Lamy, P. LAB-FAB-APP. Investing
in the European Future We Want.
European Commission, Luxemburg,
2017; https://bit.ly/2sEIMKP
5. Mazzucato, M. Mission-Oriented
Research and Innovation in the
European Union—A problem-solving
approach to fuel innovation-led
growth. European Commission;
https://ec.europa.eu/info/sites/info/
files/mazzucato_report_2018.pdf
6. Oxfam. The commitment to reducing
inequality index 2018—A global
ranking of governments based on
what they are doing to tackle the gap
between rich and poor; www.oxfam.
org
7. Rittel, H. W. J. and Webber, M. M. Wicked
problems. Man-made Futures 26, 1
(1974), 272–280.
8. Schön, D.A. The Reflective Practitioner:
How Professionals Think in Action.
Routledge, 2017.
9. United Nations. Transforming
our World: The 2030 Agenda for
Sustainable Development (UN), 2015;
https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org
10. Von Hippel, E. Democratizing
Innovation. MI T Press, Cambridge,
MA, 2005.
Jan Gulliksen is a professor of human
computer interaction and vice president
for digitalization at KTH Royal Institute of
Technology, Stockholm, Sweden.
Copyright held by author/owner.
zucato5 to target the overall
goals of research to address
the forefront of development. Horizon 2020 aims
for challenges, while Horizon Europe seems to focus
more toward missions. A
possible mission agreed
by many is to join forces to
achieve the Sustainability
Development Goals.
9
˲ Increasingly complex
research problems. The challenges on today’s research
agenda are becoming bigger
and more complex, requiring large multidisciplinary
collaboration teams. While
traditional research strives
to limit and focus research
questions to problems
that could derive scientific
conclusions beyond any
doubt, today’s problems
are becoming increasingly
more “wicked,”
7 without
the opportunity to isolate
particular phenomena
for empirical testing. To
research such problems
requires methodologies
and processes to develop
knowledge under these conditions, ensuring scientific
rigor, quality, and ethical
standards being met.
˲ Multidisciplinarity
opportunities and challenges.
Today’s complex problems
require a more genuine and
open collaboration across
a wide range of different
disciplines. It requires each
individual builds a broad understanding of the context
of research far beyond the
disciplinary research agenda
in addition to the depth
required within their own
field.
1 It requires true trans-disciplinary work, including
social science and humanities (SSH) from the outset,
to be able to tackle complex
problems in technical and
medical research and innovation in a meaningful way.
˲ Unprecedented techno-
logical development. The last
decades of development has
seen the birth and growth
of many groundbreaking
innovations that changed
our everyday lives. Advance-
ments have had an impact
not only on the technology
itself, but also on disci-
plines such as medicine,
SSH, economy, and basic
science. There is no reason
to think development will
slow down, rather we must
embrace and support the
development and maintain
high ethical standards in
the development.
˲ Innovation. One of the
major political arguments
for investing in research
is that it will eventually
lead to the development of
new products, services, or
knowledge with the potential to create new companies, employment opportunities, and eventually
contribute to the economic
growth of the society. The
mechanisms for supporting
more disruptive innovation
is essential.
10
˲ End-user involvement
and citizen science. An essen-
tial characterizing aspect of
future research and innova-
tion is the need to incorpo-
rate and involve the general
public to a much larger ex-
tent and engage in so-called
citizen science.
2 People may
become involved as partici-
pants, for example, in more
action-oriented research
projects sharing their
personal data.
3 To be able
to address our future chal-
lenges, they will become
reflective practitioners8 in
the analysis and reconstruc-
tion of the society.
˲ Connection to education.
Digitalization means changing the ways we educate
by providing opportunities to offer education to
everybody. I foresee a time
when learning is a lifelong
commitment, with people
spending 10%–20% of their
work time continuing their
education in order to learn
new skills and make oneself
relevant as the future unfolds. These needs must be
addressed when building
the research community, as
there is a tight and important connection between
research and education.
˲ Research leadership.
There is a need for leadership that understands trans-disciplinary research and
knows how best to engage
participants. Trustworthy and engaging leaders
can guide teams through
complex, wicked problem
solving.
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4
gross value added
of business economy
in high-tech sectors
World share
of scientific publications
World share
of highly cited
scientific publications
Number of researchers
(FTE)
Researchers per thousand
labor force
PCT patent applications
per million population
Comparative and growth rates of scientific publications, highly
cited scientific publications, researchers, patent applications and
valued-added of high-tech sectors in the EU compared to the U.S.
