A cross-cutting issue of Horizon 2020, the Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) concept pushed forward by the European Commission (EC) aims to foster and facilitate research and innovation in an inclusive, societally-oriented way. The EC-funded RRI Tools project has gathered and developed online resources – the RRI Toolkit – allowing closer interactions of the actors of research and innovation systems. It also addresses topics such as open access, gender in science, ethics, science education, governance, public engagement. The Toolkit is designed for individuals as well as institutions involved in research, policy-making, business, education, or civil society organizations. It comprises 350+ tools, including best practices, participatory techniques, how-tos to implement cross-collaboration and interdisciplinarity, guidelines, self-assessment tools and training resources.

“Europe wants to promote not only excellent but also socially desirable science and technology: it is vital to align the objectives of research and innovation processes with the needs and values of the societies that support them. There is clear evidence that today we need to involve the whole of society in the decisions about the development of science and technology so we can all contribute to the smart, sustainable, and inclusive growth of our societies. This is the core of the ambitious initiative of the European Commission on Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) as a cross-cutting issue in Horizon 2020, the current Framework Programme for Research and Innovation.

In this context, RRI Tools has been set up in order to empower all actors to contribute their share to the Responsible Research and Innovation initiative. Funded under the Framework Programme FP7 (2007-2013), the final outcome of RRI Tools is to develop a set of digital resources to advocate, train, disseminate and implement RRI under Horizon 2020.”

The RRI Toolkit will be made public on 7 March 2016 at www.rri-tools.eu