In European research and innovation policy, a balance is currently being sought between investing in cutting-edge technologies and promoting human-centered development. Developing socially sustainable solutions requires a stronger role for the social sciences and humanities already in the early stages of RDI processes, not only after technological solutions have been completed.
There is a clear need to strengthen the position of the social sciences and humanities (SSH) in European research and innovation programmes. This was discussed in December 2025 at the Human Values and Grand Challenges conference organized during Denmark’s EU Presidency. The event, arranged by Danish universities and the European Commission, brought together researchers, representatives of universities and research organizations, funders, and decision-makers from across Europe.
A key concern raised at the conference was that research funding is increasingly directed toward investments in cutting-edge technologies, seen as necessary for strengthening global competitiveness and addressing major societal challenges. The social sciences and humanities risk receiving decreasing attention in funding priorities.
To ensure that research and development take a socially and ecologically sustainable direction, SSH should be involved from the outset in defining and solving societally significant problems.
The President of the European Research Council, Maria Leptin, reminded the audience that few societal challenges are fundamentally technical in nature. For example, the development of artificial intelligence has raised fundamental questions about responsibility, justice, and privacy. Mitigating climate change and biodiversity loss, in turn, requires understanding human behavior and the functioning of political systems. Fields such as ethics, sociology, law, and history provide essential insights into these issues.
Denmark’s Minister for Higher Education and Science, Christina Egelund, emphasized the importance of understanding what kind of society we want technologies to build and serve. Social sciences and humanities play a central role in creating this understanding. Taking a human-centered approach as the starting point for development gives Europe a competitive advantage: it safeguards European values such as freedom, democracy, and social justice, and strengthens societal stability and resilience.
Too often, the SSH are included in research and development projects only at a late stage, to provide ethical and societal perspectives on interpreting research results. Leptin stressed that SSH should help define challenges and envision desired solutions already at the beginning of the RDI process.
The role of social sciences and humanities is recognized nationally
Developing socially and ecologically sustainable solutions requires a multidisciplinary and cross-sectoral approach. This creates better conditions for research and innovation to support European values, advance social equality, and strengthen ecological sustainability.
The concern raised at EU level about increasingly technology-driven research funding has been acknowledged also in the Strategic Choices for National RDI Policy and Activities framework in Finland, the implementation of which began in early 2026.
The plan of the Research and Innovation Council highlights the new and unexpected combinations enabled by interdisciplinarity and explicitly recognizes the central role of the humanities, social sciences, and creative fields in the sustainability transition, in the development and deployment of technologies and innovations, and in strengthening resilience and societal security.
The Finnish Research Impact Foundation supports this policy direction in concrete ways. In 2025, we launched the TIA Connect programme, in which SSH researchers and companies jointly define research problems and approaches to addressing them. The research topics have included societal resilience, social equality, consumer behavior, privacy protection, and the circular economy.
Research funders play a key role in strengthening the position of SSH in research and innovation activities. This requires structures that support joint problem definition and the co-creation of solutions.
