BU Research Blog

The Enabling an Equitable Digital Society call has at its very core the ethics and socio-economics of global digitisation. The EPSRC seeks in accordance with its digital economy theme to fund the creation of human-centred transformational digital technologies and services that enable an equitable digital society. The fund will support research to rapidly realise the transformational impact of digital technologies on aspects of community life, cultural experiences, future society, and the economy.

It is expected that technical outputs will be delivered, that “support novel, adventurous multidisciplinary, sociotechnical and co-created research to create an equitable digital society”.

Details to Note:

• Date open: 22 June 2021
• Closing date: 14 September 2021
• Max. award: £625,000 – £1,250,000 (of total fund of £5 million) at 80% Fec

All research should be grounded in an understanding of:

• human-centred design of digital technologies
• equity, fairness, inclusivity, and barriers to equitability in the digital economy
• the nature of inclusion in digital environments
• the nuanced experience of marginalised groups online
• the intersectional effects of the digital economy on people’s welfare

Your team must include:

• researchers from at least two disciplines across the EPSRC, ESRC and AHRC portfolio
• at least one early-career researcher at lecturer level as principal or co-investigator
• at least one researcher co-investigator at postdoctoral level

At its core, the equitable digital society priority area is about improving people’s lives, and projects should seek to benefit marginalised and vulnerable people and groups, clearly identify citizens’ needs, and explain how these will be addressed as an outcome of the research.

For further details, see Enabling an equitable digital society

Contact Nicolette Barsdorf-Liebchen at nbliebchen@bournemouth.ac.uk should you be interested in this call.