European science conversations
by the community, for the community
One of the many challenges people with various degrees of sensory disabilities face is their difficulty to access mainstream products and services and therefore they are often excluded from enjoying audio-visual services.
Internet, audiovisual media and digital technology are transforming our world. Their potential, however, will not be fully realised until they become fully accessible, enabling all citizens to participate in everyday life.
The balance between professional and personal life plays a key role for successful careers of European researchers, especially for women scientists. As far as employment and reconciliation of work and life are concerned, female employment rates remain low especially in Southern Europe and East Europe and in general even more for women with low education. Antidiscrimination laws have been adopted, but gender gaps are still large. Lack of child care services and care facilities for the elderly combined with rigid work arrangements make it hard to reconcile work and family life.
NuitDebout (Standing Night) is an occupation of the République square that gathers hundreds to thousands of people each day. #SciencesDebout is an initiative from a few scientists who took a felt and a cardboard and wrote “I’m a physicist/historian/anything, ask me your questions!”.
For every characteristic of uberisation, there is a parallel in the world of research. This raises the question of whether research was “uberised” before Uber even existed? In this article EuroScientist explores which aspects in research have been most impacted by technology, and the challenges ahead to leverage uberisation for the good of science and scientists.
As it nears its tenth anniversary, the European Charter for Researcher has failed to be fully implemented across Europe. This disappointing state of affairs shows that there are still many ways in which the status of researchers in Europe can be improved. Yet, future improvements hinge on such documents having more binding power in the future.
As waves of researchers’ protest are about to invade the streets of Paris, Rome and Madrid, among others, there is a clear sense of déjà vu in these white coats with large signs walking the avenues of European capitals. What is new, however, is that these protests on longer follow a logic of being centred around national territories. They have become supra-national and aim to target the central power in Brussels as much as national governments.
Research activism in Europe is about to transcend borders. Forthcoming protests movements planned for around mid-October in France, Italy and Spain are not a coincidence. Scientists will rally their respective capitals—be it on their bike or on foot—as a result of unprecedented concerted planning. Up until recently, the scientists involved did not collaborate across borders to campaign for a change in their own working environment. Yet, they are no strangers to international collaboration when it comes to collaborative research projects. So what triggered this shift in attitude?
Protests concerning the French government’s policy on public research and higher education (PRHE) has arisen in France during the course of 2014. Interestingly, these protests are taking place five and ten years, respectively, after the previous research activism movements of 2004 and 2009. So why such protest? Find out more in this riveting perspective by Alain Trautmann, former spokesperson of the 2004 protest movement, Sauvons la Recherche. He provides the benefit of hindsight into 15 years of French research policy and, thus, gives a unique analysis of the current research activism movements in France.
Pablo Echenique-Robba stared his political career back in January 2014. Until then, his day job was to work as a physicist for the public research agency CSIC, working, among others of the issue of proteins folding. He is involved in a citizen democracy movement, called Podemos. Echenique shares his view on science in Spain and in Europe in an exclusive interview to EuroScientist.
I want to learn what makes scientists tick. And what is important in their lives. I found some answers at the Agricultural Genetics Institute, in Hanoi, Vietnam. This is the first of a documentary series, called One World One Lab, featuring scientists from eight different countries around the world. This video is a window into the research world, which is not about complex research data. Instead, it is about culture, street life, religion and all the strange and tasty foods.
Achieving a work-life balance is a challenge for many people working today. Yet, the idea of a shorter working week is undergoing something of a revival. Part-time work can, in principle, contribute to calming down the ‘rush hour of life’. However, it is not always a possible. This is particularly the case for people in management positions. The proportion of managers working part-time varies considerably across countries. Our multilevel analyses show that it is cultural factors and normative expectations rather than legal regulations, which explain these differences.
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