A New Focus on AI and Society
In June 2026, the EUPeace Alliance officially launched its fifth Research Hub, dedicated to Artificial Intelligence and Societal Transformation. This hub was established to respond to the growing influence of AI across public and private life, bringing together experts from across the alliance’s nine universities to examine both the technology itself and its wider ethical and social consequences. With a strong emphasis on inclusivity, the hub actively welcomes researchers from science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines, helping to deepen the alliance’s engagement with technical innovation and combining it with a human-centred approach.
Interdisciplinary Collaboration for Real-World Impact
The new hub is designed as a dynamic, interdisciplinary network that connects researchers from diverse fields—computer science, ethics, law, social sciences, and humanities—to examine how AI shapes societies, economies, and governance. Through regular virtual meetings, thematic working groups, and collaborative seminars, members are already developing ideas how research can feed into innovative teaching and the dissemination and co-creation of knowledge to reach an academic audience, but also to inform the public debate and political processes beyond that. The hub, thus, also supports early-career researchers and doctoral students, offering opportunities for mobility, mentorship, and participation in EUPeace’s broader academic events.
Strengthening Research and Education Across the Alliance
The hub plays a key role in advancing EUPeace’s mission to link research, teaching, and student engagement. By integrating research activities with doctoral education, the hub enables students and early-career researchers to contribute to cutting-edge projects while gaining experience in transdisciplinary collaboration. Selected in-person meetings and mobility activities are supported through dedicated funding, allowing researchers to work closely across institutions. The hub also contributes to the development of joint funding proposals, thereby strengthening the alliance as an independent actor in the European research landscape.
Building a Connected and Responsive Research Community
As part of EUPeace’s broader research strategy, the AI and Societal Transformation Hub works closely with the other four existing hubs—Security and Conflict Transformation, Climate Science and Just Transition, Migration and Human Rights, and Inclusive Health and Well-Being—to identify shared challenges and co-develop solutions. The alliance is also advancing shared research infrastructure and open-lab policies to ensure all members can access tools and data, regardless of location. Together, these efforts are strengthening the alliance’s capacity to respond to complex global challenges through collaborative, people-centred research.
