HERA brings new funding opportunities for humanities research
14 Oct 08
The ERA-NET for the Humanities in the European Research Area (HERA) will be launching a joint European research programme and call for research proposals in early 2009, which will be open also for Finnish researchers. There are two main themes in the programme, “Cultural Dynamics” and “Humanities as a Source of Creativity and Innovation”.
The first stage of the two-stage call process will be opened in February 2009, and funding decisions are expected by the end of the year. The research projects are due to start at the beginning of 2010.
Science Adviser Kustaa Multamäki from the Academy of Finland is involved in HERA in a coordinating role, overseeing a work package aimed at identifying common themes for the new programme: “In the end we came up with a list of almost 100 themes, which were grouped into a dozen or so categories. The HERA Steering Committee shortlisted five of these for further consideration and eventually narrowed them down to two.”
HERA is the first ever ERA-NET project in the field of the humanities. Compared to many other disciplines there has been fairly limited cooperation among funding agencies and to some extent among researchers in the humanities. According to Multamäki, part of the reason for this lies in history: in many European countries the humanities have been centrally involved in building national identities, which have largely shaped and influenced the choice of research themes.
One common funding pot
“In the context of HERA we’ve done a lot of groundwork to create a common platform for research, starting from a European citation index and an overview of the archives and providing open access to them,” Multamäki says.
In addition to 13 full partner countries, HERA involves a number of associated organisations from several European countries. The European Science Foundation ESF and its member networks are also involved. “In a sense, the Academy has a dual membership in HERA – we’re involved both independently and through the ESF.”
Academy funding to the new programme will amount to around 850,000 euros. Overall, programme funding will add up to 20 million euros, which will be placed in one common funding pot. Multamäki is pleased with the arrangement: “It makes for quicker funding decisions, even though the initial decision-making may take somewhat more time.”
If HERA succeeds in securing ERA-NET+ funding, the common pot will increase by a further six million euros pledged by the EU.
Financial contributions made available through HERA are determined on the basis of public research funding in each participating country as a proportion of total R&D funding. Multamäki is keen to encourage Finnish humanities researchers, both young and more experienced scholars, to file applications for HERA funding even if the research themes may seem hard to tackle. However, it is always ultimately down to the researchers themselves to decide from what perspective they approach those themes.
“I should imagine that Finland is an interesting research partner from a European perspective. For instance, we have excellent registers and datasets here that can be used for purposes of comparative research.”
Multamäki believes that the opportunity for European networking creates significant added value for HERA. “It’s possible that in future, European research in the humanities and social sciences will continue to converge. For the time being, there are still clearly visible differences in approaches and methodologies, for example.”
“I’ve recently been touring the country to provide information about HERA and NORFACE, the European ERA-NET in social sciences coordinated by the Academy. Judging by the feedback received this has been a good idea.”
Text: Tiina Ruulio
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