Project description
Making cultural heritage a driver of resilience
Intangible cultural heritage (ICH) helps communities preserve identity and adapt to change, yet existing frameworks focus mainly on safeguarding rather than resilience. The EU-funded RESCUE project aims to make ICH’s contribution to societal resilience, climate adaptation and sustainable local economies measurable and actionable. It will develop the RESCUE Nexus, a framework to assess how communities absorb, adapt to and transform in response to pressures. Twelve partners in eight European countries will validate it through six living labs. The resulting Nexus Toolkit will combine assessment methods, locally tailored action plans and tools for comparing experiences. This will help policymakers and communities use living heritage to foster inclusive, climate-ready and socially cohesive societies.
Objective
Intangible Cultural Heritage is recognised by UNESCO as a vital driver of community identity, continuity, and adaptability, yet current frameworks treat ICH primarily as an object of safeguarding rather than as an active capability for resilience. Across Europe, ICH-bearing groups face intensifying pressures: climate change, displacement, digital exploitation, and the erosion of transmission pathways. Current policy and research frameworks treat ICH primarily as an object of safeguarding rather than as an active capability for resilience. RESCUE addresses this gap by introducing the RESCUE Nexus: an assessment and action framework that makes ICH contributions to resilience visible, measurable, and actionable. The Nexus operates as a 3×3 grid crossing three Impact Domains (Societal Resilience, Climate Adaptation, Sustainable Local Economies) with three Resilience Capacities (absorptive, adaptive, transformative), and delivers outputs through three functions: Diagnosis (producing a Resilience Capacity Profile for each context), Configuration (translating diagnostic findings into locally grounded intervention plans), and Comparison (enabling structured learning across contexts and scales). A consortium of 12 partners across 8 European countries will build and validate the framework through six Living Labs spanning post-conflict recovery, indigenous and minority heritage, digital heritage networks, and mountain and maritime regions. RESCUE delivers eight Key Exploitable Results consolidated into a Nexus Toolkit that bridges science, policy, and practice through governance baselines, participatory methods, heritage-based economic approaches, and digital innovation, complementing EU infrastructures, including ECCCH and DS4C The project ensures gender balance, intergenerational inclusion, and the participation of marginalised groups, positioning ICH as a strategic resource for climate-ready, socially cohesive European societies while establishing a forward-looking agenda.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
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Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.2.2 - Culture, creativity and inclusive society
MAIN PROGRAMME
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HORIZON.2.2.2 - Cultural Heritage
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-RIA - HORIZON Research and Innovation Actions
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) HORIZON-CL2-2025-02-TWO-STAGE
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
LT-10223 Vilnius
Lithuania
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.