GSS EU Science Funding Gateway

Pure technology watch-based approaches are not helpful for civil security decision makers unless they are embedded in a qualitative assessment of threats and capabilities. Such assessment shifts the focus from a purely technological standpoint to the way in which these technologies are and will be used in a given policy, operational, industrial and societal context.

This should allow to identify how future civil security technology, research, innovation and industrial trends impact, influence and shape future threats and security capabilities, taking into account contextual aspects. These may include ethical, legal, societal, economic, geopolitical, environmental or industrial aspects, with particular emphasis on the capacity of the EU security technology and industrial base to achieve the desired technology development objectives, thus safeguarding the EU security technology sovereignty, if and when this is required. The proposed approach should combine qualitative and quantitative methods, maximise their automation and allow for qualified inputs through distributed and collaborative environment/schemes in order to make the most efficient and effective use of the human and technical resources available.

The proposals should take into account existing foresight approaches implemented by other EU and international organisations (e.g. JRC, EDA, INTERPOL, UNIDO, etc.). Should these be used as a reference, the newly proposed approaches should not just replicate the existing ones, but reference the source accordingly and adapt them to the context of EU civil security.