The project analyzes the transformation of the German police force, particularly with regard to its personnel and training policy since 1990.
Against the background of a pluralizing society, access to the police service and socio-cultural skills in the police force are examined empirically, in terms of legal and democratic theory as well as organizational sociology.
Duration: 01.03.2019 - 31.01.2024
Support: Deutsche Hochschule der Polizei (DHPol)
Funding: Stiftung Mercator
The European joint project "INDIGO - Information in the EU's Digitalized Governance" deals with fundamental issues of digitalization in the European Union, with the Freiburg sub-project focusing on e-governance in the European single market. It deals with legal issues of automated - in particular AI-supported - decision-making in the implementation of EU law.
The project is funded by the AEI, AKA, DFG and FNR and is being carried out together with other European research funding organizations via the NORFACE network, which is co-funded by the European Commission through the Horizon 2020 framework programme.
Duration: 01.11.2020 - 31.10.2023
Project management: Prof. Dr. Jens-Peter Schneider
Funding: AEI (Agencia Estatal de Investigación), AKA (Academy of Finland), DFG and FNR (Fonds National de la Recherche)
The ERAME project aims to develop a procedure supported by software tools that will help security authorities monitor and analyze extremist content on YouTube. The Freiburg sub-project includes the legal monitoring and evaluation of the project as well as the contribution of legal expertise to the development process.
Duration: 01.12.2020 - 31.11.2022
Project management at the CSS: Dr. Benjamin Rusteberg, Dr. Nicholas Eschenbruch
Support: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)
Artificial Intelligence and Civil Security: A Study on the Effects of the Future Vision “Artificial Intelligence made in Germany” on applied security research
With its National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence, published in 2018 under the title "Artificial Intelligence made in Germany", the German Federal Government presents its idea of the future development and application of AI. The project analyses how this sociotechnical imaginary is constructed in political discourse and how it structures the field of applied security research in Germany.
Duration: 01.04.2020 - 31.03.2022
Project management: Dr. Jens Hälterlein
Support: Fritz Thyssen Foundation
The goal of the SUSQRA project is to develop a software system that can be used to determine the expected extent of damage by unconventional explosive devices. The software shall be applicable for different categories of explosive devices. In addition, an analysis tool is planned which will effectively support the forensic evaluation after an event.
Duration: 01.09.2018 - 31.12.2021
Projekt Management: Prof. Dr. Stefan Kaufmann
Support: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)
Scientific Assistence: Dr. Jan Schank
The goal of TRESSPASS is to develop, demonstrate and validate a single cohesive risk-based border management concept for air, maritime and land border crossing points. It follows an “ethics and data protection by design” approach.
The 42-month EU H2020 innovation action project will address border control tasks at regular border crossing points, such as customs and smuggling prevention, immigration control, police searches for suspects, as well as cross border crime and terrorism prevention. Under a newly developed single cohesive concept, related threats will be managed as risks tailored to the specific situational needs of individual border crossing points.
TRESSPASS does not address border crossings outside of regular border crossing points (e.g. by boat). Threats posed by state-actors are out of scope, as well.
Building on previous ethical research as part of the project XP-DITE, the role of the University of Freiburg’s Centre for Security and Society is to provide the basis and input needed to address ethical, legal and societal aspects from the start and throughout the design and development process, with a special focus on data protection needs. Furthermore, Freiburg also leads the tasks related to accompanying research ethics.
TRESSPASS is a strong European Consortium of 22 partners. It is coordinated by the Greek National Centre for Scientific Research “Demokritos”. The project is funded by the European Union under the Horizon 2020 programme, Grant Agreement No. 787120.
Find more information on the project's homepage
Duration: 01.06.2018 - 30.11.2021
Lead for the University of Freiburg contribution: PD Dr. Elisa Orrù
Support: EU Horizon 2020
Security concepts for railway tunnels – e.g. for fire safety, evacuation, rescue and fire-fighting operations - have so far been drawn up on the basis of individual expert opinions and experience. In contrast, SIKET focuses on research findings and a systematic approach. Taking into account both organisational and structural aspects, the aim of the project is to develop suggestions for improving security concepts on the basis of scientific analyses and simulations of escape systems as well as smoke distribution.
With a Sociology of Knowledge approach, the sociological subproject will record and model the forms and types of organisation and knowledge transmission among the participating rescue organizations. Role concepts for improving simulation environments and exercise scripts will be developed. Rescue exercises that will have been carried out in the project will be evaluated from a specific perspective: In view of the unavoidable artificiality of such exercises, criteria for determining their closeness to reality will be developed. Regarding the improvement of security concepts, criteria for determining security levels will be developed.
Find a more detailed project description here
Duration: 01.08.2018 - 31.07.2021
Project management: Prof. Dr. Stefan Kaufmann
Support: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)
Scientific Assistance: Sabine Blum, Markus Jenki
The Security Research Dialogue was set up in 2007 by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. Since 01. August 2016, the “Supporting office to the Security Research Dialogue” has been located at the Center for Security and Society CSS.
The Office promotes the establishment and continuation of a network of researchers from the humanities, the social sciences and the natural sciences in civil security research and promotes scientific excellence in this research field. This is achieved in particular by the conception and organization of events such as workshops, conferences and other public events as well as by the promotion of young academics. In all of these activities, the Supporting Office is committed to interdisciplinary dialogue and the development and integration of international and, in particular, EU security research.
Through the events and other impulses, the Security Research Dialogue contributes to the dynamic determination of the research needs in this field and also provides scientific debates to the interested public.
Find more information on the project's homepage
Duration: 01.08.2016 - 31.07.2021
Project management: Dr. Nicholas Eschenbruch
Support: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)
Scientific Assistance: Sabrina Ellebrecht (until 02/2019), Dr. Björn Brömmelsiek
The Eucor universities, including the University of Freiburg, and the University of Koblenz and Landau, and further project partners intend to establish a trinational graduate academy on the topic of risk management and risk appraisal. A joint qualification program for junior researchers and a knowledge transfer program with businesses and political organizations will open up new research potential on the Upper Rhine. The EU will provide 1.8 million euros in funding for the project.
Duration: 01.01.2016 - 30.06.2019
Project management: Prof. Dr. Hans-Helmuth Gander
Support: EU Interreg
“RESIBES – Resilience through networks of spontaneous volunteers for emergency and crisis response”, aims to support the establishing of a network of help and helpers. By the means of innovative and robust technological solutions, this network can be activated in a rapid and coordinated manner in cases of emergencies and crisis. Together with the German Red Cross Frankfurt am Main, who brings the perspectives of the user into the project, the task of the sociological sub-project is to identify the aid- and volunteer network.
Duration: 01.02.2016 - 30.04.2019
Project management: Prof. Dr. Stefan Kaufmann
Support: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)
The project aims at developing a systemic and systematic practical method to validate and compare different system designs concerning resilience.
Duration: 01.05.2015 - 30.09.2018
Project management: Prof. Dr. Stefan Kaufmann
Support: Fraunhofer Gesellschaft and the state Baden-Württemberg
The multi-disciplinary, collaborative research project aims to better interlink the different agents within emergency medical services. For this purpose new audio-visual communication media such as data goggles are developed and tested. The sociological research project explores general effects on professional interactions by observing the use of similar communication media in different organisations. Moreover, the technical solution developed by project partners will be monitored and evaluated during two large-scale exercises. A triage study is also part of the project.
Duration: 01.06.2015 - 31.05.2018
Project management: Prof. Dr. Hans-Helmuth Gander
Support: EU Horizon 2020
EVADEX's purpose is to set standards in the broad field outside aviation against threats deriving from explosion hazards or chemical accidents. The project is coordinated by Fraunhofer ICT and funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. While André Biermann's remit includes investigations about societal aspects of detection technologies, Martina F. Biebert is concerned with the animal alternative: explosive detection dogs. The subproject's task is to formulate and correlate the very diversity of aspects and criteria evolving in questions of acceptance in particular societal realms.
Duration: 01.11.2014 - 31.10.2017
Project management: Prof. Dr. Stefan Kaufmann
Support: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)
Having begun on 01. September 2012, the EU FP7 funded project XP-DITE (New integrated approach for airport security checkpoints) has been conducting research in the field of aviation security. Its main goal is to develop a new and balanced approach for the design and evaluation of airport checkpoints, which would not just meet growing security needs, but would balance these with operational demands as well as ethical and societal requirements.
Duration: 01.09.2012 - 31.12.2017
Project management: Prof. Dr. Hans-Helmuth Gander
Support: 7th EU-Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development
Mass rescue operations at sea hold several aggravating circumstances, for example difficult access for rescue workes, limited space aboard, limited means of transport and long distances. The management of such an incident requires the effective cooperation of various actors. The aim of the project KOMPASS is to design, elaborate and implement an integrative management system for patient care and rescue operations at sea, which consists of structural, organizational and technical measures. The solutions are developed in close cooperation with stake holders and end-users. They will be evaluated in several exercises based on realistic scenarios.
Duration: 01.09.2012 - 31.12.2017
Project management: Prof. Dr. Stefan Kaufmann
Support: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)
TeraSCREEN develops an innovative concept of multi-frequency multi-mode Terahertz (THz) detection with new automatic detection and classification functionalities. The system developed demonstrates, at a live control point, the safe automatic detection and classification of objects concealed under clothing, whilst respecting privacy and increasing current throughput rates. This innovative screening system combines multi-frequency images taken by passive and active imagers which scan the subjects and obtain complementary information, thus allowing for automatic threat recognition.
Duration: 01.05.2013 - 31.10.2017
Project management: Dr. Nicholas Eschenbruch
Support: EU FP-7
The multi-disciplinary, collaborative research project aims to better interlink the different agents within emergency medical services. For this purpose new audio-visual communication media such as data goggles are developed and tested. The sociological research project explores general effects on professional interactions by observing the use of similar communication media in different organisations. Moreover, the technical solution developed by project partners will be monitored and evaluated during two large-scale exercises. A triage study is also part of the project.
Duration: 01.10.2014 - 30.09.2017
Project management: Prof. Dr. Stefan Kaufmann
Support: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)
The ENCOUNTER project aims to assess current state of the art capability in both neutralisation of small scale IEDs and in mitigation of the effects of a detonated IED, leading to development of improved capability in both areas.
Duration: 01.09.2012 - 31.11.2016
Project management: Prof. Dr. Gisela Riescher
Support: 7th EU-Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development
The KORSE project work aims at the theoretical, doctrinal, and practical aspects of the advancing Europeanisation, internationalisation and globalisation of security law. At the theoretical level, fundamental questions of a Europeanised security law will be dealt with. Firstly, this will concern fundamental normative questions on the balancing of security and freedom in a multilevel system of democratic orders, shaped by human rights, and questions on the relations between different ideas of security and the law. For example, the capacity of new key concepts in the security discourse, such as resilience, will be examined. Secondly, fundamental theoretical terms, such as threat or risk, will be developed in a European law context. Dealing with the fundamental normative and theoretical questions is a necessary condition for the complementary research of ethics, which is increasingly demanded and supported, also on the European level.
Duration: 01.12.2012 - 31.08.2016
Project management: Prof. Dr. Ralf Poscher
Support: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)
With the discussion of new threats, resilience has become an emerging security paradigm and a governmental strategy. Against this background, the proposed research project asks, how organized emergency response is reconfigured in Germany, particularly in metropolises, and on the organizational level. The central features of this transformation become manifest in mass casualty incident plans, which have been (re-)formulated in most German cities.
Duration: 01.08.2013 - 30.06.2015
Project management: Prof. Dr. Stefan Kaufmann
Support: Gerda Henkel Stiftung
SURVEILLE is a multi-disciplinary collaborative research project funded within the European Commission FP7 framework. The project analyzes the ethical issues, legal limitations and efficiency of the use of surveillance technologies for the prevention, investigation and prosecution of serious crimes. This research aims to inform developers and manufacturers of surveillance technologies through a systematically delivered advisory service. SURVEILLE will also contribute toward the training of judges, prosecutors and police forces.
Duration: 01.02.012 - 30.06.2015
Project management: Prof. Dr. Hans-Helmuth Gander
Support: 7th EU-Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development
The BESECURE project aimed to improve the way policy makers use knowledge, experiences and data in their decision making process in urban security. The project developed novel tools that emphasise knowledge sharing and evidence-based policy design and that are grounded in an extensive review of urban security practices from across Europe. Through case studies in eight urban areas across Europe, the project amassed a wide compendium of interesting practices. Based on case study work and further exploration, the project established a robust information structure to capture the essential dimensions of urban security practices and make them transferrable.
Duration: 01.04.2012 - 31.03.2015
Project management: Prof. Dr. Stefan Kaufmann
Support: 7th EU-Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development