Social innovation is acknowledged as one of the most promising tools of civic engagement and cross-sector partnerships to address social problems. It benefits society by improving its ability to organize and act and represents a new model of interaction between the state and civil society in...

For quite some time, European countries have felt the need to compare their respective performances through the application of benchmarking and scoreboard tools, the findings of which are typically processed into country rankings, which in turn guarantee considerable publicity in the media and...

In many countries which have limited R&D budgets are confronted with discussions about the feasibility and appropriateness of supporting basic science and research. Among these countries is Austria – the country of origin of the authors. Basic research as opposed to applied research aims at...

In Barcelona, the European Union set ambitious targets for the European Research Area, calling for research expenditures equivalent to 3 % of Europe’s GDP by 2010. This paper analyses the implications of these targets, assesses the influence of the member states, and examines the role of the...