The second Parliamentary TA Debate took place on April 7 and 8 2014, at the Portuguese Parliament in Lisbon. Policy-makers from all over Europe met and shared their experiences with respect to governance of science, technology and innovation.

Their discussions focused on the paths for strengthening TA for policy-making and addressed questions such as:

• In which direction should Technology Assessment head in order to increase its usefulness to policymakers and to democracy?
• How do the various political cultures of science and of democracy within Europe affect Technology Assessment?
• How can the EU contribute to the strengthening of Technology Assessment across Europe?

Participants discussed these questions on the basis of concrete projects and initiatives, and of their everyday life as politicians and policy-makers.

Find here the programme, the policy brief, the report and below the presentations made during the meeting.

Presentations:

• Lars Klüver, PACITA coordinator and Director of the Danish Board of Technology, Denmark: The PACITA project: Strengthening knowledge-based and socially robust policy-making.
• René Longet, former member of the Swiss Parliament and expert in sustainable development, Switzerland: 30 years of Technology Assessment for Parliaments – and still valid today.
• Leonhard Hennen, Institut für Technikfolgenabschätzung und Systemanalyse (ITAS), Germany: A next wave of TA? Barriers and opportunities for expanding the European TA landscape.
• Maria de Belém Roseira, Assembly of Republic, Parliamentary Committee of Foreign Affairs and Portuguese Communities, Portugal: Paths towards a responsible introduction of Public Health Genomics.
• Felix Gutzwiller, Swiss Parliament, Committee for Science, Education and Culture of the Council of States, Switzerland: Societal and political issues in personalized healthcare.
• René von Schomberg, DG Research and Innovation of the European Commission (participating in personal capacity), Brussels: Open and responsible innovation for addressing the “grand challenges”. You can read his full article here.

Video presentations:

• Introduction
  • Debating Technology Assessment, a short introduction. Wiebe Bijker, Professor of Technology & Society at the University of Maastricht, the Netherlands

• Doing politics and shaping policies with Technology Assessment
  • Paths towards a responsible introduction of Public health genomics. Maria de Belém Roseira, Assembly of Republic, Parliamentary Committee of Foreign Affairs and Portuguese Communities, Portugal
  • Societal and political issues in personalized healthcare. Felix Gutzwiler, Swiss Parliament, Committee for Science, Education and Culture of the C ouncil of States, Switzerland
  • STOA at the service of the European Parliament. António Fernando Correia de Campos, European Parliament, Chairman of the Science and Technology Op tions Assessment (STOA) Panel, Brussels
  • New mobilities and ecological vehicles. Michel Antoine, Deputy Director of the Parliamentary Office for Evaluation of cientific and Technological Options (OPECST), France

• Keynote
  • Open and responsible innovation for addressing the “grand challenges”. René von Schomberg, DG Research and Innovation of the European Commission (participating in personal capacity) , Brussels

• Prospects for parliamentary TA in new countries. Panel discussion and dialogue with:
  • Sébastien Brunet, Head of the Walloon Institute for Evaluation, Prospective and Statistics (IWEPS), Belgium
  • Rui Pedro Duarte, Assembly of Republic, Committee on Education, Science and Culture, Portugal
  • Alena Gajduskova, Parliament of the Czech Republic, First Vice-President of the Senate, Czech Republic
  • Leonhard Hennen, Institut für Technikfolgenabschätzung und Systemanalyse (ITAS), Germany
  • David Cope, Foundation fellow, Clare Hall, University of Cambridge and former Director of the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, United Kingdom

Moderation: Wiebe Bijker

• (Re)establishing links between Parliament and Technology Assessment: TA in Austria and Denmark: reconsidering the role of TA towards Parliament
  • Jens Henrik Thulesen Dahl, Danish Parliament, Research, Innovation and Further Education Committee, Denmark
  • Ruperta Lichtenecker, Austrian Parliament, Chairwoman of t he Committee for Research, Innovation and Technology, Austria

• Strengthening Technology Assessment in Europe. Panel discussion and dialogue with:
  • Ulla Burchardt, former member of the German Parliament, lecturer at the Technische Universität Dortmund, Germany
  • Jan Kaźmierczak, Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Sejm (Parliament) of the Republic of Poland
  • Rinie van Est, Rathenau Institute, the Netherlands
  • Francisco Veloso, Professor at Católica Lisbon School of Business and Economics, member of the Portuguese Council for Entreprene urship and Innovation, Portugal
  • Michel Antoine, Deputy Director of the Parliamentary Office for Evaluation of cientific and Technological Options (OPECST), France

Moderation: Lars Klüver

• Closing remarks: Sergio Bellucci, Director of the Swiss Centre for Technology Assessment TA-SWISS, Switzerland