The Significance of Research in National and European Space.

Confederation of European Union Rectors’ Conferences – EU Research Policy Working Groupors’ Conferences–EU Research Policy Working Group

I represented NTUA in the Committee of European Educational Programmes and, from 1996 onwards, represented the Conference of Rectors of Greek Universities in the Working Group for European Research Policy.

The Working Group for European Research Policy held regular and substantive meetings in Brussels from September 1996 (Chairman: Professor H. Newby) and continued for several years thereafter. The objective was to exchange views and experience on the correlation between European university education and the unified European research area, and to formulate research policy recommendations for the Confederation and other European research bodies (European Science Foundation, Council of Europe, CRE).

Working groups, seminars, and meetings generated significant views and recommendations on fundamental research, research evaluation systems, the mapping of European social research, the development of effective European training networks for doctoral candidates and postdoctoral researchers, Community Programmes, university engagement with the public and private sectors, industry partnerships, innovative financing mechanisms, research excellence, and the establishment of the European Research Council—all with the goal of ensuring high-quality European scientific activity.

Meetings and working sessions took place in Crete on 22–23 May 1998.

Throughout my long-term participation in the Committee, and amid the prevailing climate of European homogeneity in the formulation of issues and the selection of policies, the necessity became ever more apparent to me: the need to structure and support a national educational and research policy that is socially sensitive and oriented towards long-term developmental and cultural objectives. (See NTUA document, ref. no. 8762, 14 April 2003.)