Generative adversarial networks (GANs) are a class of AI models able to create media contents audio and video resembling reality. Although there are different promising areas of application of GANs e.g. audio-graphic productions, human-computer interactions, satire, artistic creative expression their current and foreseen misleading uses are just as numerous and worrying. The main concern is related to the so-called deepfakes, fake images or videos simulating real events with extreme precision. If trained on a face, GANs can make it move and speak in a hyper-realistic way. This technology poses an urgent political threat since GANs could be and have already been used to spread fake news and disinformation. This raises an urgent challenge to democratic governance and regulation: to improve GANs accountability, transparency, and trustworthiness. Nevertheless, GANs also constitute an opportunity to enhance democratic awareness and expand active and inclusive citizenship. SOLARIS reacts to these challenges in two ways. On the one hand, we analyse political risks associated with these technologies, to prevent negative implications for EU democracies. As a result, SOLARIS will establish regulatory innovations to detect and mitigate deepfake risks. On the other hand, we assess the opportunities raised by GANs for reinvigorating the democratic engagement of citizens. We will co-create, involving citizen science, value-based GANs contents to enhance democratic engagement. SOLARIS involves three use cases: the first aims at understanding the psychological aspects of GANs perceived trustworthiness. The second simulates the circulation of threatening GANs contents on social media, to detect risks and design mitigation strategies. The third co-creates value-based GANs contents to boost awareness on key global democratic topics (e.g: climate change, gender dimension, human migration), to ultimately enhance active and inclusive digital citizenship.

The informed consent (IC) process allows the subject to voluntarily decide whether or not his/her participation in research. Generally, ICs are difficult to read documents that do not include all stakeholders’ perceptions. Therefore, informative IC should be a process that include needed information under a gender and age perspective, more importantly if these are vulnerable populations. The relationship between science and society should favour the engagement inclusion of citizens in the informed consent process, and this must be done with especial attention to gender and ethics considerations. The IC process should also improve health literacy in the citizens. The I-CONSENT project presents a simple work plan structure with a WP1 aimed to analyze baseline knowledge of IC, WP2 presenting innovative solutions and WP3 proposing new guidelines, disseminated in WP4. For this i-CONSENT consortium presents a multi-stakeholder community of partners from academia, public health, patient organizations, clinicians and private sector, including pharma and SMEs, and a set of activities that will maximize the collection (workshops) and dissemination (communication plan) of information. Specifically, and to ensure alignment with the Topic scope, the project will use a selection of 3 different vaccines as study frame to improve guidelines for informed consents. These do focus on vulnerable age populations with very special emphasis on gender: Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) vaccines (preadolescent and adolescents), Meningitis (adults) and Respiratory Syncitial Virus (pregnant women). Besides Gender and Ethic issues as centre of the proposal, the project will consider the interaction of age and gender, with its specifics as comprehension of medical information, oral and written language, and availability and use of new technologies will also be considered.

Gestational surrogacy (GS) is transnational practice of assisted reproduction increasingly undergone by European citizens in Member States and Third Countries. Women’s Movements (WMs), primary actors in policies on human reproduction, understand GS either as a form of commodification of women and children, or as an empowering opportunity for women in poor countries. WMs are forging alliances with other stakeholders (LGBTQI, pro-life, and private actors) to influence decision makers to abolish or to regulate GS. WoMoGeS analyzes the ‘politics of signification’ on GS of WMs in 2 developed countries, US, and Italy, and 2 developing countries, India and Mexico, to reveal variety of diagnostic, prognostic and motivational frames, their policy demands and strategic alliances across different social contexts, and the interplay between discourses and policy making at country-level and transnationally. By carrying out a comparison of 4 context-specific case-studies and engaging WMs and GS stakeholders, this project aims to hinder the risk that GS activism reproduces the same polarizing dynamics as in the debate on prostitution, and the risk that WMs’ perspectives in developing countries, main providers of surrogate mothers, are silenced by more visible WMs in developed countries. WoMoGeS aims to promote dialogue between WMs and GS stakeholders, catalyze European policy making on GS that considers diversity of thought, and to propose mature reflections on assisted reproduction based on scientific information. Training and supervision by top experts on GS at UT and on WMs at LUMSA will enable me to continue skill development started during my PhD on WMs’ contribution to gender-related discourses, strengthen my ability to work across different fields of Sociology, and acquire new competences in Bioethics and comparative social analysis, with the goal to consolidate my profile as sociologist expert in gender studies and critical analysis of social movements' discourses.

Aim of EMLE is to provide students with advanced knowledge in 'Law and Economics' (L&E). This integrated discipline studies economic effects of legal rules and the legal bases of economic efficiency. A comparative approach is used to evaluate strengths/weaknesses of alternative legal rules from an economic viewpoint. L&E builds on the insight that economics is a behavioural science, able to explain and predict how people act under various legal conditions, revealing which legal instruments are most efficient in addressing market failures (e.g. market power, negative externalities (e.g. pollution and risk-creation), and information-asymmetry (e.g. between producers and consumers)). Economic analysis also informs policymakers about economic effects of rules aiming at other social goals than efficiency. By studying economic rationales of lawmaking, L&E provides a positive analysis of and normative benchmark for the actions of policymakers, administrative agencies and courts. L&E has become increasingly relevant in the modern policy debate. EMLE is a 1-year Master covering all major fields of L&E, from the traditional fields of private law, competition policy and economic regulation to analyses of international and EU law, Law & Finance, innovation and the digital economy. Insights from behavioural economics are included in the curriculum. Due to the increasing importance of empirical methods and their usefulness for policymaking, Empirical Legal Studies are part of the curriculum. In the 1st and 2nd term, students (max. 35/class) study in 1 of 3 universities. In the 3rd term, students choose between 6 universities in smaller classes. In the first 2 terms courses on the core topics in L&E are taught. Specialisation starts in the 2nd term and is completed in the 3rd term with 2 further specialised courses and a thesis. EMLE-graduates are trained to work for private companies, public organisations, economic advisors, (multinational) lawfirms, but also for Ph.D. research.

The project aims at enhancing quality of design and delivery of initial teacher education (ITE) towards increasing the professionalism bar for teaching profession in Kosovo through the implementation of European-inspired quality assurance mechanism that produce teacher professionalism aspired by teaching profession in Kosovo. The two important concepts in this project are 1) internal quality assurance mechanism in Initial Teacher Education (including but not limited to program review, organised monitoring, collecting feedback from students on quality of teaching and learning resources, review of quality of student services, review of managerial practices including staff policies, review of research activity etc, and 2) the development of teacher professionalism. The project makes the link in a way that the proposed internal quality assurance mechanism needs to contribute to the achievement of the desired professionalism in school system. The desired professionalism is referred to the policy set up for the teaching profession which the internal quality assurance system needs to contribute to. In addition, in order to achieve a quality culture in initial teacher education, the project supports the development of management skills and practices to manage internal quality assurance as well as development of teacher educator competencies to be able to deliver quality courses (specified in quality indicators for teaching in teacher education) that are in line with the expectations of professionalism in teaching profession and at the service of school reform. In order to address this, the project provides capacity building and resources for teacher educators and managers of initial teacher education. In this way the project brings all stakeholders together to link to the development of a quality culture in teacher education in Kosovo.