Continuing to nurture the exchange between senior and junior researchers, between lecturers and students and between the CES research community and wider publics, scientific events organised during the previous year have continued to identify the main challenges posed across the four thematic areas that characterize research at the Associate Laboratory: ‘Institutions, Regulation and Citizenship’, ‘New Solidarities: Local, National, Global’, ‘Science, Technology and Humanities’ and ‘Cultures and Social Dynamics’.

In 2008, CES initiated a broad programme of events to commemorate its 30th anniversary. Assessing 30 years of growth and consolidation of CES can only be justified as a way to reflect upon the future paths and challenges – in various old and new domains. Activities planned for this commemorative programme are being framed by two major international colloquia devoted to pondering the future of the social sciences. The first one, a major international colloquium, Routes into the Future: New Maps for the Social and Human sciences, was held in June 2008. This central event promoted a wide reflection on the relations, dialogues and tensions which currently stamp the heterogeneous domain of the Social and Human Sciences (SHS) and their diverse contexts of development.Seven major transversal themes were approached from multi- disciplinary perspectives, engaging the humanities and the social sciences, with leading interventions from internationally invited speakers and from researchers from CES. Prior to the Conference, and following an open call for papers, a one-day Workshop was organised, whereby about 200 young social scientists gathered at CES to discuss their own approaches onto the New maps for the social and human sciences.This commemorative project continues in 2009 and ends in 2010 with an international colloquium devoted to the pluralities of Portugal now and its inclusion in the wider world.

About ten other large-scale international events also associated to this commemorative programme. They gathered national and international scholars from a wide range ofresearch areas in the humanities, natural and social sciences,to engage in stimulating intellectual debates on topics such as human rights and global justice, Portuguese and Brazilian experiences on solidary economy, democracy and judicial courts, traffic of women and sexual exploitation, cities and new urban lexicons, symbolic representations and material practices of violence and peace, creative articulations between various forms of art, social research practice and activism. These events are thoroughly described in the report.

These events, as well as many others, were fully embedded in the ongoing activities of the different Research Groups, Observatories, individual research projects and networks, as well as in the activities of the Doctoral Programmes organised in partnership with the School of Economics (FEUC), the School of Law (FDUC) and the School of Arts and Humanities (FLUC).

Whilst details of the scientific output of the research team are fully included in the report, the synthesis illustrates the broader output, disseminated extensively at national and international levels, following on the continued growth of all indicators at CES in recent years.

CES has continued its line of support to young social scientists from countries with Portuguese as official language. The continuation of the Cycle of Annual Conferences “Young Social Scientists”, which has brought young researchers from different institutions – national and foreign - and across disciplines for seminars and debates at CES, is another example of the concern with the strengthening of the social and human sciences community in Portugal.

The development of the CES/FEUC Doctoral Programmes, has seen in 2008 the opening of two new programmes, Cities and Urban Cultures and Work Relations, Social Inequality and Trade Unionism. This leads to a total number of eight doctoral programmes being offered and organised by CES. This development articulates with the investment on the promotion of several series of seminars for doctoral and post-doctoral students, but also on the continued organisation of advanced training programmes targeted to wider publics.

Still, the wider communication of the results to different actors and society at large remains a challenge. We have looked to strengthen this area, through new dedicated internal staff, and the development and consolidation of a number of strategies, among them a substantial restructuring of the website and the reinforcement of CES’ public image and visual identity. Part of this new visual identity was developed through a new institutional brochure named “O Saber ocupa lugar”, carefully designed and produced to be a crucial information tool and widely used in several commemorating events of the 30th anniversary of CES.

CES publications continued to be published regularly, RCCS, CES Working Papers, Poetry Workshop, Cabo dos Trabalhos and CES Newsletter. Additionally, a new online peer-reviewed publication – e-cadernos ces – gathers papers resulting from conferences, seminars and workshops, as well as research papers accomplished within advanced training programmes and scientific research projects. The North-South Library has continued to expand and integrate within the wider University Library activities and cataloguing system (SIBUC). The reading space for the Library was significantly expanded. The improvement of the infrastructure also continued at different levels.

It has been a very dynamic year as the following pages fully detail, and yet much of the results of work developed during the current year will certainly be more visible in the Annual Reports of the coming years.

Continuing to nurture the exchange between senior and junior researchers, between lecturers and students and between the CES research community and wider publics, scientific events organised during the previous year have continued to identify the main challenges posed across the four thematic areas that characterize research at the Associate Laboratory: ‘Institutions, Regulation and Citizenship’, ‘New Solidarities: Local, National, Global’, ‘Science, Technology and Humanities’ and ‘Cultures and Social Dynamics’. It is difficult to pinpoint one particular event which has marked debates during this year or which had a most memorable intervention by an invited speaker, in a year characterized mostly by the diversity of the different initiatives, and by the initial preparatory work for the celebration of 30 years of activity of CES during 2008. Nevertheless, several events organised in the past year could be highlighted: the organisation of the VI International Meeting of Poets, with the collaboration of CES, brought to Coimbra a large number of Portuguese and foreign poets; in June, the Peace Studies Group organised the Seventh International CISS Millennium Conference; following recent advanced research in this area at CES, a Conference on Islam and Christianity in Dialogue: A political approach, brought interesting reflections with the participation of two leading researchers on these current debates; the seminar on Citizenship, Public Policies and Social Networks, bringing together a network of European and Latin American researchers debated new forms of social citizenship; the conference Governance, Health and Medicine: Opening dialogue between social scientists and users, organised in Paris together with the Centre de Sociologie de l’Innovation, is an example of the new dialogues between social and natural sciences, and the new boundaries between knowledge production and use. Many other important initiatives can be found in the following pages.

These seminars are fully embedded in ongoing activities of the different Research Groups, Observatories and individual research projects and networks, as well as in the activities of the Doctoral Programmes organised in partnership with the School of Economics (FEUC). During this year the new Research Group on Architecture and Urban Studies was created in CES, together with the inclusion of new researchers in this area of studies, further contributing to the integration and dialogue between the social sciences and the humanities which has been a distinctive mark of the Centre. The consolidation of the research team continued with the hiring of a new full-time researcher within the Associate Laboratory, and the opening of new positions following the ‘Ciência 2007’ programme. These will contribute to the creation of two new observatories, in addition to the ones described in this report.

Whilst details of the scientific output of the research team are fully included in the report, the synthesis illustrates the broader output, disseminated extensively at national and international levels, following on the continued growth of all indicators at CES in recent years.

CES has continued its line of support to young social scientists from countries with Portuguese as official language. The award of the 2007 CES Prize to two promising social scientists, Clara Sarmento and Susana Noronha, remains as a major initiative at national level in this area. The continuation of the Cycle of Young Social Scientists, which has brought young researchers from different institutions – national and foreign - and across disciplines for seminars and debates at CES, is another example of the concern with the strengthening of the social and human sciences community in Portugal.

The development of the CES/FEUC Doctoral Programmes, which has seen in 2007 the opening of a new program, Democracy in the 21st Century, continues as central to the advanced training programmes promoted at CES. This includes also a series of advanced training programmes, focusing on reaching wider publics, which has continued during the past year.

Still, the wider communication of the results to different actors and society at large remains a challenge. We have looked to strengthen this area, through new dedicated internal staff, the continuation of the implementation of an information management database, and the establishment of a new collaboration with a design office, which has led to the introduction of a new logo, associated to the celebration of the 30 years of CES in 2008, and the renewal of the graphic image. This has been extended to the project of renewing the website organisation and image.

CES publications continued to be published regularly, RCCS, CES Working Papers, Poetry Workshop, Cabo dos Trabalhos and CES Newsletter. The North-South Library has continued its expansion and the integration within the wider University cataloguing system (SIBUC). In addition, following the increasing demand for the library, the reading space for the Library was significantly expanded. The improvement of the infrastructure also continued at different levels.

It has been a very dynamic year as the following pages fully detail, and yet much of the results of work developed during the current year will certainly be more visible in the coming years Annual Reports.