Jaime García del Barrio, director From the ICS: "We offer a humanistic and innovative compass in an increasingly technological world."

Months of study, reports, interviews with experts and an inspiring trip to the United States to visit reference letter research centers such as the Earth Institute at Columbia, the Institute for Advanced Studies at Princeton or the National Humanities Center at North Carolina. But, above all, a great work . These are some of the memories treasured by Jaime García del Barrio, director of the Institute for Culture and SocietyThese are some of the memories that Jaime García del Barrio, director of the Institute for Culture and Society, has of the first steps of the ICS, the Humanities and Social Sciences Center of the University, which celebrates its 15th anniversary this year. On this special date, he takes stock of an "exciting adventure full of learning". Today, the ICS employs 84 professionals from 16 scientific disciplines, coming from 20 countries. Here you can learn more about their work and research.

How do you remember the origins of ICS?
At the University, we already had prestige in the biosanitary field and a research center like CIMA, and also in the business world, with IESE. However, although we had many projects in the Humanities and social sciences, they were not as well visualized and did not have the impact they could have. That's why the Office of the Executive Council and the Chancellor's Office saw the need to push this area forward. It was nice to see the involvement of everyone, and the agility and depth with which we worked to design the roadmap, the format of the center, the business and financing plan and the search for talent.

What are the main milestones?
We wanted to create a culture of our own at ICS that would permeate the entire university. At that time, in the Humanities and social sciences, it was not so common to apply for competitive projects, measure performance or offer performance-based rewards. In that sense, we were pioneers. We wanted the center to be a living organism, capable of adapting to changes, where stable groups and projects with more time limits coexisted, and where the transfer to society was always present.

We also realized that multidisciplinarity and international outreach were key and we proposed, especially at the beginning, to establish alliances only with reference letter universities, also to learn from them. It was very demanding, but it helped us to promote a culture based on excellence, continuous improvement and research quality. In addition, we have always carried out external evaluations, as objective and transparent as possible, to avoid inbreeding and self-complacency.

Therefore, I would like to thank all ICS researchers for having been able to fill in the dynamics of the traditional university world with others that have allowed us to meet the objectives. And also for the generosity with which they have joined this challenge.

What distinguishes the ICS?
Research excellence, multidisciplinarity, international character and social impact are in our DNA, not as something cosmetic, but as something deeply proper. We are convinced that knowledge must converge to solve people's real problems. We offer a humanistic and innovative compass in an increasingly technological world.

And what does it bring to the University?
A culture of research excellence in the field of Humanities and social sciences, regardless of the discipline or subject of study. We have also helped the internationalization of the University and contributed to the work of professor. Even researchers who carry out their full professional work at the ICS give up to 60 hours of teaching. We are very grateful to the University and the Schools for having allowed us to count on the time and work of many brilliant people so that the ICS could be born and carry out its mission statement.

What current challenges are you trying to address through your research?
We are researching major areas of the 25-30 Strategy, such as family, health and care, through projects that promote palliative care, the strengthening of family relationships, psychological well-being and meaningful aging. We also work on projects that contribute to economic, social and public health development in Africa and Latin America.

In addition, this year, with the ICSchallenge "Orientalism and Occidentalism: crossed views", in which 20 international researchers participated, we have had the opportunity to better understand the relations between East and West. Another of today's major concerns is the hijacking of attention, a field that we are also studying with great interest with the help of the Museum.

Where is ICS looking to and what are its future projects?
For us it is fundamental to maintain a culture of continuous improvement and constant learning, with the determination to implement the necessary changes to achieve this. We look to the whole world, but with special interest to the Americas and the Arab world, where we are working to develop new academic training and leadership projects in partnership with other institutions in each region.

We seek to continue to attract talent, establish partnerships and network research with universities around the world. In a polarized society, we need, more than ever, spaces for dialogue. To achieve these objectives and continue to attract talent, we seek to maintain stable funding (around 50% comes from external sources).

We have set up an endowment (a fund whose part of its yield will be used to finance the center's activities) which we expect to reach 10 million euros over the next 5 years. The Chair Gustavo Cisneros, which we presented in Madrid this Wednesday, will be a great boost for the center and will also improve our positioning in Latin America and the deployment of new activities in the region.