Riverhood in the event “Citizen Science in ERC projects”

On December 7th 2022, Rutgerd Boelens, Daniele Tubino, and Bibiana Duarte-Abadia attended the “Citizen Science in ERC projects: Mapping ERC frontier research” event, promoted by the European Research Council, in Brussels, Belgium. Riverhood (which was awarded an ERC Consolidator grant – grant agreement No 101002921) was included in the selected research projects (showcase ERC projects citizen science) presented at the event that use citizen science as one of their methodological approaches. Citizen science constitutes a method that can be included in the innovative approach promoted by Riverhood called “river co-learning arenas” (RCA), which are multi-stakeholders interactive spaces for the promotion of action research to be conducted in the multiple river cases around the world, composing this research endeavor.

The event counted also with presentations of leading scholars in the area of citizen science and generated an interesting debate on the subject, especially in relation to questions concerning ethics in this type of research and the key added value that citizen science can bring to scientific research if it maintains a critical perspective on its application and preserves its potential to add multiple perspectives on the issues at stake.