The high school of Sociology and Political Science of Navarra will develop a Social Citizenlaboratory in the region with the partnership of I-COMMUNITAS: Institute of research Advanced Social of the Public University of Navarra and the Institute for Culture and Society (ICS) of the University of Navarra. It is supported by the Government of Navarra through the Citizen Attention and Participation Service of the department of Citizen and Institutional Relations.

The initiative has been presented during a press conference with the participation of Luis Campos Iturralde, Dean of high school of Sociology and Political Science of Navarra; Javier Espinosa, manager of laboratory Social Citizen; Juan María Sánchez Prieto, director of I-COMMUNITAS; and Ana Marta González, scientific coordinator of the ICS.

As they have explained, the laboratory Social aims to be a collaborativetool through which, as a final product, for two days, several groups of people with very different characteristics will work together with the goal to develop projects that provide solutions to social issues of great interest to Navarra.

The laboratory Social, which will take place on June 6 and 7, 2019, is preceded by a selection process of themes, call for projects and collaborations.

The laboratory Social is a tool designed by the high school of Sociology and Political Science of Navarra that has as goal make available to the Navarra society a methodological reflection on different areas of social current affairs. The instructions of the call can be download on the website of high school of Sociology and Political Science of Navarra.

As explained by Luis Campos, the laboratory "seeks to create a space for participation and collaborative intelligence in which to work and prototype methodologies, projects, etc. that attempt to provide solutions to social problems, or part of these, that currently affect contemporary Navarre society".

For his part, Javier Espinosa commented that the main task of the initiative is to "highlight the need and importance of addressing the problems and their multiple solutions from the traditional rupture of disciplines, proposing a hacking of the forms of work through contact and the sharing of work multidisciplinary as source of development and partnership as a fundamental process".

In his speech, the director of I-COMMUNITAS emphasized that "the progress of knowledge cannot remain locked in the ivory tower of the academy, it must influence the transformation of public policies and of the same social and political institutions in order to provide an adequate response to collective problems and to the different needs of people, guaranteeing their human dignity".

Finally, the ICS scientific coordinator pointed out that research in the social sciences "does not deal with objects that cannot speak, but with people, who have their own voice. Therefore, it must always move between reflexivity and listening. While delving into contemporary scientific debates, the social research must seek ways of dialogue with citizens and social agents".