Research

The process of accreditation of CICPRIS – Centre for Research in Political Science, International Relations and Security – by the FCT is ongoing.

I

CICPRIS and Research
In the meanwhile, the centre has already been established and implemented, featuring:

  • statutes
  • 48 researchers, including non-PhD researchers
  • 17 of these researchers meet the eligibility criteria of the FCT to obtain accreditation
  • an Executive Board and an Audit Committee elected by the General Assembly
  • a Coordinator, corresponding to the President of the Executive Board, Professor João de Almeida Santos
  • A Scientific Council, composed by all Integrated Permanent Researchers
  • the International Advisory Council (in phase of implementation, but already including members of the Monitoring Foreign Committee, listed below). The International Advisory Council has a panel of CICPRIS permanent evaluators, comprising Professors Jesús Timoteo Álvarez, John Loughlin, Pierre Musso and Sarah Childs (already proposed to FCT)
  • Journal – «ResPublica», starting a new series in n.º 9, with a new International Editorial Board – and 12 issues published, plus a special issue (about Machiavelli) in preparation to be published in the last week of December. Total in 2013: 13 issues, both digital and paper forms
  • one «Site»/CICPRIS, in the ULHT’s platform

II

The foreign researchers/Professors who have already accepted to integrate the CICPRIS advisory council and the editorial board of «ResPublica» are:

III

The above-mentioned Professors, members of CICPRIS and of the Editorial Board of «ResPublica», are our links with their respective universities in order to:

  • prepare an international PhD program, through the signature of due protocols;
  • develop an international net of scientific journals, particularly those issued by the concerned universities;
  • organize international scientific events;
  • integrate the CICPRIS’ International Advisory Council and the Monitoring Foreign Committee.

IV

Research programs (in installation phase and to be developed after 2020), including those already existing:

African and Lusophone Studies with an Observatory of Lusophone Africa
Executive Director: Professor Fernando Campos
Religion and Society.
Executive Director: Professor Henrique Pinto
Permanent Observatory of telepolitics and politics on the net.
Executive Director: Professor José Filipe Pinto.
Annual Report on the quality of democracy in Portugal.
Executive Director: Professor Bernardo Ivo Cruz
Evolutionary trends of European integration (political, institutional, economic, financial, fiscal, security).
Executive Director: Professor António Gameiro.
Studies on Security.
Executive Director: Professor Sérgio Vieira da Silva.
Electoral studies.
Executive Director: Professor Paulo Morais.
Gramscian studies on hegemony in cooperation with «Fondazione Istituto Gramsci»
Executive Director: Professor João de Almeida Santos.

V

For the 2015-2020 period, two Research Groups will develop two major programs, already presented to FCT as part of the CICPRIS’ accreditation process.

Group 1: «Politics and Security in digital and network society » (26 researchers).

This program comprises two subgroups, one subgroup will study the «structural changes of the political phenomenon in digital and network society», from the perspective of the formation of the political will, the participation and communication – from the media and organizational paradigms of communication and politics to the digital and networked as well as diluted (political) power paradigms; comparative study of Portuguese and Italian cases, and a first approach to the Chinese case.
The other subgroup will study «Security – from public to private security». A comparative study of the situation of private security and its relationship with public security in EU countries and the USA: legislation, operators, agents, areas of intervention, skills, training, relations with the public forces – in-depth study of the State and security in democracy.

This program, taking place between 2015 and 2020, will be associated with some institutional partners, through the signature of protocols for research, namely «Fondazione Istituto Gramsci», from Rome (protocol signed) and Securitas, SA, the second largest world security company (protocol signed). There are also ongoing negotiations with the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the signature of a cooperation protocol in the field of scientific research.

Scientific Area: Political Science

Group 2: «State and Regional Integration in the CPLP countries» (18 researchers).

This program also comprises two subgroups.

One subgroup will study the organic communities and the state in Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique, involving the respective political systems, the structure of the state, the systems of government, the party systems, the ethnic composition of the populations, the communitarian systems, the identities and religious communities, the existing media systems, the urban component of the societies, the role of ICT in the evolution of these societies – from economy and communication to political systems.
The other subgroup will focus on the «African Political Communities of Regional Integration in the area of CPLP», their relationship with the European Union – models and new dynamics –, the special partnership Cape Verde-EU and the CPLP’s role in the emerging new world order and in the South Atlantic area.

This program, taking place between 2015 and 2020, will be associated to CPLP as institutional partner. There is already an institutional framework of cooperation between the CPLP and COFAC, based on several protocols, the ULHT being CPLP’s «Advisory Observer». The program also includes the Lusophone Africa’s Observatory, a notary’s registered entity, committed to the research program «African and Lusophone Studies». There will also be a protocol signed with «Eurosondagem» – a survey and opinion polls portuguese firm – to be added to this program. This research program has already its own journal named: «Africanology: Lusophone Journal of African Studies» (on-paper and on–line), associated with the CICPRIS’ journal «ResPublica».

Scientific Area: Political Science