The Federal Ministry of Education and Research provides funding for research projects aimed at developing technologies that can help governmental and non-governmental stakeholders as well as citizens and migrants overcome current and future challenges. The goal is to devise new security and support solutions that show great promise in terms of practical benefit and potential for implementation. Part of the funding goes to bilateral projects conducted with Austria. The two countries have decided to pool their resources and collaborate on research to ensure optimised processes for admitting migrants on humanitarian grounds, transferring them and providing them with food, accommodation and basic necessities.

A large share of Germany’s and France’s populations live in urban areas and conurbations. The diverse range of leisure and cultural activities on offer make a major contribution to the quality of life of urban populations. However, high infrastructure density, coupled with changes in population structure, can lead to new threats to civil security, requiring new solutions to be found. The “Future of urban security” programme, run jointly by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR), is intended to provide funding for interdisciplinary research projects to improve urban security in France and Germany.

New approaches to civil security help to increase public safety as well as strengthening the competitiveness and innovative capacity of Germany’s security industry. The “Civil security – New economic aspects” call for proposals is intended to promote the development of new economic frameworks, value creation methods and innovative approaches for business models for a modern security industry. In particular, funding is available for projects that assess these models’ suitability in practice, implement them by way of example and thus improve civil security in our liberal society.

With urbanisation on the increase, more and more people now live and work in towns and cities. The challenge for councils and local authorities is to ensure continued protection for citizens now and in the future. Core issues include neighbourhood security and local public transport security, protection against crime and protection against extreme weather conditions. The BMBF has therefore issued a call for proposals on the topic of urban security, as part of the “Research for civil security” programme, with the aim of increasing security in urban areas.

Security solutions can only be effective if they fit in with day-to-day routines and if they work for society. The “Social dimensions of civil security research” call for proposals in the Federal Government’s security research programme is designed to consider issues related to society. The BMBF is expecting to see projects concerning developments in security culture and institutional security architecture. Challenges posed by technologisation are also relevant. Interdisciplinary questions regarding the requirements that innovative security solutions place on society, how they are embedded in society and what they mean for society are of interest under this call for proposals.