Project description
Alternative policy options to boost European social citizenship
All citizens of an EU country are automatically citizens of the EU who enjoy important extra rights and responsibilities. But the concept of European social citizenship – the bond between equals joined by a shared fate – is different. Crucial for social integration, it hinges on membership in a community based on equal parts. The EU-funded EUSOCIALCIT project will review policies to boost European social citizenship. It will develop a resource-based, multi-level concept of social rights at EU, national and local levels. The project will also identify the shortcomings of the institutions and gauge citizens' attitudes. By analysing current realities and alternative policy options, it will provide new indicators and implementation studies on social investment, working conditions, minimum income protection and housing.
Objective
EUSOCIALCIT will provide scientific analysis and examine policy scenarios to strengthen European social citizenship. It focuses on three domains that mirror the building blocks of the European Pillar of Social Rights (the empowerment of citizens, fair working conditions and social inclusion) and pursues five objectives:
1. Bring together long-standing rival approaches to European social citizenship, and develop a resource-based, multi-level concept of social rights (recognizing that the resources supporting social rights can be located at EU, national and local levels).
2. Understand the current state of social rights and their relationship to outcomes (social and gender inequality, poverty and precariousness).
3. Diagnose the shortcomings of the institutions that generate undesirable outcomes.
4. Understand attitudes, preferences and the demand for change among citizens, and the constraints and opportunities these create for the EU social agenda.
5. Develop alternative policy scenarios to strengthen European social rights, in particular to implement the European Pillar of Social Rights.
This promises a more encompassing understanding of European social citizenship than existing literature now offers. We will provide new indicators and implementation studies on social investment, working conditions, minimum income protection and housing. The project is deliberately ambitious in terms of both science and policy because effective policies require in-depth analysis of current realities and alternative policy options, both empirically and conceptually. The consortium has been formed to realise that ambition, by combining academic expertise – in political science, law, sociology, social policy and economics – with practical policy experience. Our emphasis on the plurality of possible policy scenarios, on listening to citizens and co-creation testifies to our conviction that an academic and policy-oriented research project should serve the public debate, not replace it.
Fields of science
Programme(s)
- H2020-EU.3.6. - SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Europe In A Changing World - Inclusive, Innovative And Reflective Societies Main Programme
- H2020-EU.3.6.1.1. - The mechanisms to promote smart, sustainable and inclusive growth
- H2020-EU.3.6.1.2. - Trusted organisations, practices, services and policies that are necessary to build resilient, inclusive, participatory, open and creative societies in Europe, in particular taking into account migration, integration and demographic change
Call for proposal
H2020-SC6-GOVERNANCE-2018-2019-2020
See other projects for this callSub call
H2020-SC6-GOVERNANCE-2019
Funding Scheme
RIA - Research and Innovation actionCoordinator
1012WX Amsterdam
Netherlands