We are the EU Policy Lab
The EU Policy Lab is a space for cross-disciplinary exploration and innovation in policymaking. We apply collaborative, systemic and forward-looking approaches to help bringing the scientific knowledge of the Joint Research Centre into EU policymaking.
We experiment with the new, the unprecedented and the unknown. We seek to augment our understanding of the present, challenge and reinvent the way we think about the future.
The EU Policy Lab is also a mindset and a way of working together that combines stories and data, anticipation and analysis, imagination and action. We bring new practical and radical perspectives to tackle complex problems in a collaborative way. Together, we explore, connect and ideate to create better policies.
Foresight
Foresight explores long-term futures and creates shared visions for policymaking.
Our lab supports EU policymaking by providing strategic and future-oriented input, developing an anticipatory culture inside the European Commission, continuously experimenting and developing different methods and tools to make foresight practically useful for decision-making processes.
Design for Policy
Design is the creative catalyst of innovation in policymaking.
In our lab we use design to research and gain insight into the problem, to create and test alternative solutions and to collaborate and co-create with policymakers, scientists and stakeholders all along the process.
Behavioural insights
We generate behavioural insights through an empirical approach, gathering contributions from various behavioural sciences.
Our Lab uses behavioural insights to support EU policymaking by identifying behavioural elements in policies and testing behavioural levers to increase policy effectiveness.
Our latest posts
In a world where the only constant is change, policymakers are faced with an accelerating pace of global shifts, uncertainty and unforeseen events that make long-term planning impossible.
Futures Garden is an experimental project of the Joint Research Centre’s EU Policy Lab to generate new policy ideas with citizens and policymakers to help shape a better future for Europe. We are now proud to announce the public launch of two innovative ‘artefacts from the future’.
Our regular readers may remember the launch of our ambitious design and behavioural insights projects aiming to Harmonising waste sorting labels across the EU (europa.eu). And we’ have been busy.
In the 100,000 years since we have existed as a species, it took us 90,000 years to develop agriculture, 10,000 years to industrialise, 200 years to develop nuclear power, 50 years to develop computers – and the pace of human innovation continues to increase at unprecedented speed.
The EU Policy Lab Water Resilience Experiment is a design-driven participatory initiative aiming to integrate scientific evidence and knowledge from citizens, the media, stakeholders, and local initiatives related to water to inform innovative policymaking at the European Commission.
Are humans using artificial intelligence better at making unbiased choices? Is it enough to have humans oversee AI decisions to ensure fair and balanced decisions are being made? If yes, how? What does it take for systems to be trustworthy and fair?