ESS26 - Resilience and Crises / Evaluation criteria

The following criteria are used in the evaluation.

Main evaluation criteria

• Scope: Is the project within the scope of the call as described in this document? 

Projects that do not meet the key requirements regarding scope will be rejected by the jury, regardless of scientific quality. 

The key criteria in the evaluation of proposals are scientific excellence of the project and applicants and interdisciplinarity:

• Innovative character of the proposed research project:
  • Does the proposed research advance the scientific and conceptual understanding of societal resilience in the context of selected crises and beyond?
  • To what extent does the proposed project develop and strengthen social science–driven methodological capacities to anticipate and systematically analyse potential future crisis scenarios, including through the use of diverse and innovative research approaches?
• Scientific excellence and academic potential of the applicant(s): Do the applicants demonstrate the expertise and potential to conduct the proposed research? Please note that scientific track record is measured according to academic age.
  • Does the PI&C have an excellent scientific track record in the area of social sciences? 
• Team composition and interdisciplinary collaboration: Teams should include an appropriate mix of expertise, bringing together social sciences with other disciplines (including distinct fields within the social sciences). A clear description of the roles of the individual partners and a clear project management plan must be presented. This should demonstrate how the involved researchers and their disciplinary backgrounds will contribute to critical stages of developing and executing the project, and how communication will be fostered throughout the project lifetime.
• The extent to which the proposed project addresses a societally significant crisis/crises and demonstrates clear potential to generate actionable knowledge, practical solutions, and sustainable collaborations with practitioner communities that strengthen societal resilience beyond academia for funding phase two. 

Further evaluation criteria

• Feasibility: Can the project realize its goals given the competences of the research team, the methods suggested, the timeframe, resources, and budget? 
  
• Consideration of gender aspects: The relevance of potential sex-specific and gender-related aspects of the proposed projects should be considered and explained throughout the proposal.
• Open Science: does the Proposal adhere to the principles of open science? 

Other aspects:

• Career breaks such as for parental leave, care duties and longer illnesses will be taken into account in the evaluation of the proposals. Please indicate the time periods in the applicants' CV to allow them to be considered.  

Please note that the proposal will be evaluated by a jury panel, who will be asked to act as generalists when evaluating proposals. The proposal is intended for a jury panel with expertise covering a range of topics in the field of the social sciences. There will also be some jury members with a non-academic background (in order to assess the societal relevance and impact) as well as national jury members (in order to assess the relevance for the national context).