Caucasus and Central Asia Research on Social Innovation: Development Assistance, Innovation and Societal Transformation

Project Information

CARSI

Grant agreement ID: 101086415

DOI

10.3030/101086415

EC signature date 7 November 2022

Start date 1 March 2023

End date 28 February 2027

Funded under

• Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)

Total cost

No data

EU contribution

€ 1 619 200,00

Coordinated by

DUBLIN CITY UNIVERSITY
Ireland

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - CARSI (Caucasus and Central Asia Research on Social Innovation: Development Assistance, Innovation and Societal Transformation)

Reporting period: 2023-03-01 to 2025-02-28

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Development assistance to the Caucasus and Central Asian regions has grown significantly. Not only do these regions attract international attention for some of the largest world reservoirs of natural resources, but they are also considered fertile markets for their proximity and links to Europe. What possibly distinguishes the EU’s approach from others (i.e. China, India, US) is its interest not only in technical innovation and local market shares but also the regions’ social and human development. This is a major tendency with the EC that has been addressed already as early as 2014, when development strategies started emphasising the importance of taking into account social impacts in its overall development approach. In spite of this declarative intentions by local governments, but even by EU agencies, to introduce social innovation in development and assistance have not been followed through by clear and precise instructions on how to do this. This is visible both at the international and local levels and may be due to: 1) the fact that although a framework for EU-Caucasus-Central Asia relations has significantly advanced, production of specialists and intelligence regarding the regions has not followed accordingly; 2) only a limited amount of intelligence on the region is available. As a response, CARSI is a training and research programme bringing together 16 leading institutions across two continents with a major focus on the Caucasus and Central Asia to train fellows through secondment and eventually produce new empirical evidence on the region. By processing first-hand data and thus identifying the gap between declarative approaches and reality with regards to social innovation CARSI teams will define new relationships between global social innovation approaches and social theory while working to translate research findings into policy recommendations

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

Development assistance to the Caucasus and Central Asian regions has grown significantly. However, instructions on how to maximise these inputs are still missing. CARSI is a training and research programme bringing together 16 leading institutions across two continents with a major focus on the Caucasus and Central Asia to train fellows through secondment and eventually produce new empirical evidence on the region. This has resulted, so far, into:
Academic deliverables (articles, chapters, dissertations)
Deliverables for specialised public (business forums, policy presentations, social media)
Activities targeting wider audiences (magazines, blogs, interviews, MSCA ambassador)
Launching of the website https://www.carsi-se.eu/
Coordination to join major conferences as a panel (i.e. ESCAS 2022, 2023)
Live report form (to be filled by each fellow as they have a new deliverable)

The team has remained in touch online since the beginning of the project but has also met already several times in person:
1) Kick-off meeting in Istanbul, September 2023, where most of the participants joined in person for a first session
2) ESCAS regional conference in Almaty, September 2023, where some of the participants contributed a panel and the main coordinator (Prof Polese) participated also as president of ESCAS (European Society for Central Asian Studies)
3) CESS regional conference in Almaty, June 2024, where some of the participants contributed a panel
More events are planned:
Workshop: Unorthodox Approaches to Eurasian Studies 11-13 October 2024,
International Conference: «Geopolitics, Migrations and Identities in Central Eurasia», January 8 to January 10, 2025 ESCAS and CESS supported conference, Lisbon, 8-10 January 2025 http://www.escas.org/2024/06/2025-joint-escas-cess-supported-conference/
ESCAS regional conference: “Moving Central Asian Studies ever further: Orthodox vs Unorthodox approaches” 5-8 June 2025: Tashkent and Samarkand (Uzbekistan)

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

CARSI is a training and research programme bringing together 16 leading institutions across two continents with a major focus on the Caucasus and Central Asia to train fellows through secondment and eventually produce new empirical evidence on the region. By processing first-hand data and thus identifying the gap between declarative approaches and reality with regards to social innovation CARSI teams will define new relationships between global social innovation approaches and social theory while working to translate research findings into policy recommendations. The programme relies on

1) A comprehensive training component allowing participants to gain a specialisation in a new field, sector and discipline(s); this came in the form of individual (learn-by-doing) training in the course of secondments as well as sessions at domestic and international events like the ones mentioned in section 1
2) Explore the nexus between potentially theory and practice of social innovation from a two-fold perspective. This has happened through a coordinated effort by participants for data collection during their secondments and production of academic articles and pieces for the general public

This has resulted, so far, into:
Academic deliverables (articles, chapters, dissertations)
Deliverables for specialised public (business forums, policy presentations, social media)
Activities targeting wider audiences (magazines, blogs, interviews, MSCA ambassador)
Launching of the website https://www.carsi-se.eu/

Technically, this has been made possible thanks to setting up project structures, namely:

List of deliverables shared with each seconded fellow (static report form)
List of activities to be filled by each fellow (monitoring)
Coordination to join major conferences as a panel (i.e. ESCAS 2022, 2023)
Live report form (to be filled by each fellow as they have a new deliverable)

Also, fellows secondments have been manage with the help of
Financial form
Report form with deliverables shared before secondment as a guiding document
Post-secondment briefing and follow-up
Pre-departure contract
Half stay contract
Instrument of delivery
Report form: seminar, workshop, article, testimonial requested from each secondment

The team has remained in touch online since the beginning of the project but has also met already several times in person:
1) Kick-off meeting in Istanbul, September 2023, where most of the participants joined in person for a first session
2) ESCAS regional conference in Almaty, September 2023, where some of the participants contributed a panel and the main coordinator (Prof Polese) participated also as president of ESCAS (European Society for Central Asian Studies)
3) CESS regional conference in Almaty, June 2024, where some of the participants contributed a panel
More events are planned:
Workshop: Unorthodox Approaches to Eurasian Studies 11-13 October 2024,
International Conference: «Geopolitics, Migrations and Identities in Central Eurasia», January 8 to January 10, 2025 ESCAS and CESS supported conference, Lisbon, 8-10 January 2025 http://www.escas.org/2024/06/2025-joint-escas-cess-supported-conference/
ESCAS regional conference: “Moving Central Asian Studies ever further: Orthodox vs Unorthodox approaches” 5-8 June 2025: Tashkent and Samarkand (Uzbekistan)

website