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FORET François
Units
Center for the Study of Politics
Person in charge of the Unit : Oui
The Cevipol (Centre d'Etude de la Vie Politique) is a research center of the Philosophy and Social Sciences Department of the Université libre de Bruxelles. It specializes in political sociology and comparative politics. Research within the Cevipol focuses on political life, institutions, actors, and the norms and resources of democratic systems. The processes of action, mobilisation, and legitimation are examined with both qualitative and quantitative methods, from a contemporary perspective that takes into account the long view. While consistently opening fresh empirical debates, the Cevipol updates traditional themes of political science: the distribution of power and resources among social groups, the different forms of authority, elite recruitment, conflicts between interests, identity or memory, and the weight of norms and values. Four thematic axes structure the intellectual identity of the Cevipol - Parties, Elections, and Representation - European integration: redefining communities, sovereignties, and values in conflict - Identities, societies, powers in comparison. A qualitative approach of political systems - Sport and Politics
ULB Interdisciplinary Research Institute for Sports
U-IRIS is intended to bring together research skills existing at ULB in the fields of sports and physical activity in order to stimulate collaboration and interdisciplinary research. The research carried out within U-IRIS could be the basis of evidence-based advice in various fields of sport and physical activity. ULB and each of U-IRIS partner groups, as well as their existing activities, platforms, infrastructures and collaborations, will gain in visibility, both internally and externally in a promising and rapidly evolving field. The research carried out by U-IRIS is designed to be both fundamental and applied. It is developed around five major axes: - clinics / sports medicine - high level sports / performance - rehabilitation / handicap and sports - sports and society (including education through sports) - prevention / public health / nutrition. The groups participating in U-IRIS represent the Faculties of Philosophy and Social Sciences, Medicine, Psychology and Educational Sciences, Motor Sciences, the Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management, the School of Public Health, the Research Department, ULB-Sports and the Erasme Academic Hospital.
Projetcs
The European Union (EU) has recently emerged as a significant player to promote freedom of religion and belief (FoRB) in its external policy and to build a coordinated approach of counter-radicalization (CR) in internal affairs.On both issues, public authorities at all levels of governance are led to define a ''good religion'' congruent with democratic and social norms to be protected and a ''bad religion'' that must be kept under control. The EU is no exception even if it has no direct competencies on FoRB as well as on CR and meets its usual difficulties to deal with value-loaded issues.The purpose of GOODGOD is to explain the reasons, modalities and effects of this new role of European institutions and arenas; and what is says about the contemporary recombination between the member states and the EU on one hand; between politics and religion on the other hand. The main hypothesis is that what happens at the level of the EU reflects andadapts slightly societal and political trends at work at national level: the 'securitization of religion', managed as a risk factor; its 'culturalization', as a mere symbolic resource to assert the legitimacy of public institutions and collective identity.Overall, it would mean that the EU has a limited transformative influence and is in the continuity of national secularisms and secularization.
Values at the core of European integration have been widely discussed in recent years due to major evolutions in EU governance. Claims to define common references likely to hold European countries and citizens together and to justify public action have coexisted with divergences in the interpretation of these values. ValEUR analyses three main occurrences of ''European values''. Firstly, it may be a call to identity, memory and communicative resources in a quest for legitimization (governing through values). Secondly, it may come from the necessity to deal with ethical issues calling for normative policy choices (governing values). Thirdly, values may cause legal and political conflicts and challenge established balances of powers and regulation (governed by values). The EU has encountered the three scenarios. In each configuration, ''European values'' are invoked with different meanings and purposes. The hypothesis is that common patterns can still be found, turning the EU into a ''risk polity'', a political system where values become a usual part of European politics either as an answer to or a factor creating uncertainties. The project aims at a better understanding of the reasons and modalities of the emergence of ''European values'' on the EU agenda; of the way they create unity or division, circulate and frame different models of political community for Europe.
