Core proposition. The report advances a shift from treating social sciences, arts and humanities (SSAH) as a supplementary ethics or dissemination component to making human values, societal needs and transdisciplinary problem-framing central design principles for European research and innovation (R&I). Its distinctive contribution is to connect competitiveness, resilience and innovation capacity to Europe's democratic, cultural and social foundations, rather than to technological performance and short-term economic growth alone.
Results beyond the state of the art:
• From integration to co-definition. The recommendations go beyond conventional SSAH integration by positioning SSAH as a co-leader with STEM and policy actors from the earliest stages of challenge definition, foresight, horizon scanning, strategic planning and solution design. This reframes interdisciplinary work as a unified science response to grand challenges, not as a late-stage societal add-on.
• A human-centric FP10 architecture. The report proposes that a resilient society fit for human beings should be an organising principle across all FP10 policy windows, partnerships and European Innovation Council activities. It also calls for a robust Society policy window addressing democracy, culture, education, governance, social cohesion and prosperity.
• New governance and evaluation mechanisms. It sets out concrete programme-design instruments: multidisciplinary boards, co-design panels with citizens, policy makers, NGOs, industry and researchers, SSAH input in Strategic Research and Innovation Agendas, evaluator training against mono-disciplinary bias, and weighted assessment criteria in which societal relevance, human-values alignment, interdisciplinarity and stakeholder engagement become core quality measures.
• New readiness and evidence infrastructures. The recommendations extend the technology-readiness logic by embedding Societal Readiness Assessment and social adoption considerations into R&I evaluation. They also propose secure, FAIR and AI-ready social data infrastructures, making Europe a social data powerhouse able to understand behavioural, cultural, democratic and inequality dynamics.
• Experimental implementation capacity. The proposed Human Values Innovation Labs would combine policy labs, living labs and entrepreneurship support to generate SSAH-led innovation across regions. A portfolio approach, two-step proposals and rapid-response reallocations would allow complex societal challenges to be addressed through complementary short- and long-term projects.
