SOURCE Societal Security Conference 

GLOBAL THREATS

LOCAL ACTORS

21-22 March, Haus der Europäischen Union, Vienna

(Registration link and programme below)

(For PhD students applying for travel support, please fill in relevant question in registration form)

Attention to societal security permits industry, technology developers, policy-makers and end-users to capture and act upon threats that often form on the global level (climate change, pandemics, trafficking, migration, trans-national terrorism, etc.), but play out locally. Political measures often do the reverse: efforts at security governance need contextual anchoring in specific local contexts. Media representations play a crucial role in regulating this dynamic.

The complex interplay between threats to European security and the measures put in place to address them, changes with the societal reactions they provoke. Society’s role in response to insecurity is growing—both in terms of new demands for security measures, and in terms of its own contribution to enhancing its own resilience in the face of evolving threats.

• What are the emerging challenges to societal security?
• How are stakeholder interests in societal security evolving?
• How do these changes translate into challenges to security R & D?
• What decision-critical knowledge do we need?

Few ideas have the political power as societal security, gathering together the parallel challenges of technological foresight, policy development and societal concerns into a single, interdependent ecosystem:

• How can we assure that security measures are taken in line with societal expectations?
• When does the line go between rule of law and ethics?
• How can good governance be assured when security work is increasingly automated by algorithms?
• How should and can the human dimensions of security research fit into this equation?
• What is the future of privacy in security research and development?
• How can we assure trust both people and technologies?
• Who has ownership of the costs and benefits of security research and development?

These questions and others will form the core of this SOURCE Societal Security Conference.

Keynote lectures

Surveillance & social control vs. privacy & data protection? A false juxtaposition

Douwe Korff, Emeritus Professor of International Law at London Metropolitan University, Associate of the Oxford Martin School and Visiting Fellow at Yale University

Governing Societal Security: The Norwegian Experience

Marie Benedicte Bjørnland, Norwegian Police Security Service (PST)

Societal Security in Practice 

Chaim Rafalowski, Magen David Adom

Findings from FRA research on surveillance by intelligences services and fundamental rights

Mario Oetheimer, Head of Sector Information Society, Privacy and Data Protection at the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA)

Dealing with Terrorism in the Media

Corinna Milborn, Head of News at ProSieben.Sat1.Puls4 and host of the political talk show “Pro und Contra"

Breakout sessions

Bringing Societal Security into your Media Message

Chairperson: Frank Verger and Anne-Marie van het Erve, INCONNECT

How European Security Professionals Share Information

Chairperson: Didier Bigo, King's College London

Harmonising Security with Human Rights 

Chairperson: Kristoffer Liden, Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO)

Lunchtime policy meeting - “Biometrics and Borders” (open for all conference participants)

The Lunchtime Policy Meeting is a dynamic meeting format in which the speakers give short statements, followed by an open discussion with the members of the audience allowing for a targeted discussion on a topical policy issue. This lunchtime Policy Meeting will take stock of EU developments and explore central questions concerning biometrics and borders. It will bring together policy-makers and academics and provide a platform for high-level discussion on this defining topic for EU external borders.

Speakers

Kristoffer Lidén, Senior Researcher, Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO)

Ann-Charlotte Nygård, Programme Manager, Freedoms and Justice Department, Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA), Vienna

Borut Erzen, Programme Manager, Border Management and Visa, International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD), Vienna

Niovi Vavoula, Researcher, Faculty of Law, Queen Mary University of London (QMUL)

Programme in detail

 Day 1 - 21 March 

Day 2 - 22 March