Closed call
02 June - 17 August 2021
Project grant for research into societal security
The purpose of the project grant is to give researchers the freedom to formulate their own research idea, method and implementation, and to solve a specific research task within a limited period. The focus of this grant aims to strengthen Swedish research focused on societal security, including cyber and information security.
Support form: Project support
Subject area: Humanities and Social Sciences, Natural and Engineering Sciences
Focus: Societal security
Applicant: Individual researcher
Participating researchers: Up to 6 researchers may be invited to join the application.
Grant period: 1–4 years
Grant amount: Minimum 400 000 SEK per year. Maximum 1 700 000 SEK per year
Budgetary framework: 30 million SEK per year for 3 years, of which minimum 5 million SEK per year is set aside for research into cyber and information security
Start of grant period: January 2022
Application period: 2 June 2021 (14.00/2 pm) – 17 August 2021 (14.00/2 pm)
Publication of grant award: No later than the beginning of December 2021
Please note:
- Applicants should take into account in what way applicable parts of the law governing public access to official documents and secrecy may impact on the project design, material collection, and publication of research results with open access.
- For this call, the project period shall in normal cases be a maximum of three years. If your proposed project period is longer, you must specifically justify the need for a fourth year.
- You must explain in your research plan how your stated activity level is suited to the implementation of the research project.
- You will need to have a data management plan
Opens in new window. for data generated within the research we award funds for. You must not send the plan to us, but according to our general grant terms and conditions, your administrating organisation must confirm that a data management plan will be in place when you start your project or equivalent, and also that the plan will be maintained.
Specific instructions for the call
In addition to reading the call text, you also need to consult our Guide for applicants.
The following requirements must be fulfilled in order for you to be eligible to apply for the grant. We carry out checks and reject applications that do not fulfil the requirements.
Focus
Swedish society’s preparedness against threats and crises is constantly facing new challenges. These challenges may vary in type and over time, and cover aspects such as climate change, natural catastrophes, pandemics, military threats, terrorist attacks, or destabilisation and disinformation campaigns. To address these challenges, initiatives are needed that utilise results from different research fields, aimed at safeguarding good ability to protect the population and institutions of crucial importance to society.
The wide focus of the call means that urgent issues relating to societal security can be looked at from several different perspectives. The research may cover issues relating to how the public undertaking to address threats and crises is designed, and what it should cover, as well as approaches intended to explain changes over time, or differences and similarities between countries in terms of the design and effects of societal security. Urgent issues also relate to the preparedness against specific threats of different types, and measures to reduce these. Society’s cyber and information security, preparedness against CBRNE threats and other terrorist and military threats, as well as the design and development of civil defence are examples of research fields worthy of consideration. The research may cover both local and national measures, as well as international undertakings and agreements.
The project grant aims to strengthen Swedish research focused on societal security. Research perspectives based on humanities, social sciences, and/or natural and engineering sciences may be used, and we regard inter-discplinary and multi-disciplinary approaches as urgent and potentially valuable. International comparisons and research collaborations are important for learning from experiences in other places, and for generating and gaining access to relevant knowledge. Participation in projects by junior researchers, who may contribute to strengthening and developing the research, is welcome. Projects awarded funding will be part of a larger research programme focusing on societal security, coordinated by a scientific coordinator.
Applicants should take into account the extent that applicable parts of the law governing public access to official documents and secrecy may impact on the project design, material collection, and publication of research results with open access.
The initiative is based on a Government mandate.
Applicant
The applicant must be an individual researcher. You shall be the project leader and have scientific responsibility for the project. The time you set aside for the project (your activity level, that is the percentage of a full-time equivalent) must be suited to the task and its implementation throughout the grant period.
You must hold a Swedish doctoral degree or an equivalent foreign degree, awarded no later than the deadline for this call. The degree award date we use is the date you fulfilled all the requirements for a doctoral degree, such as mandatory courses, oral defence and an approved doctoral thesis. For applicants with Swedish doctoral degrees, the award date listed in Ladok applies.
Grants from the Swedish Research Council shall be administered by a Swedish higher education institution (HEI) or another Swedish organisation that fulfils our criteria for administrating organisations. Opens in new window. Your organisation must therefore be approved as an administrating organisation for you to apply. The administrating organisation must sign your application in Prisma no later than 7 calendar days after the deadline for this call.
If you are awarded a grant, you must be employed by the administrating organisation at the start of and throughout the grant period and any additional availability period, unless the Swedish Research Council approves an exception from this requirement. The employment must equal at least 20 per cent of a full-time equivalent. You do not have to be employed by the administrating organisation at the time of applying.
Number of applications and previous grants
The requirements described in this section only apply to you as the applicant (project leader).
General information about overlaps between applications and grants
Your application must not cover costs for purposes that are already funded by the Swedish Research Council or any other funding body. Overlaps with other grants or applications may impact on the grant amount you are awarded, or be a reason for us to reject your application.
What grants may I apply for simultaneously from the Swedish Research Council?
You may only submit one application for this grant under this call. The table below shows information and restrictions for the grants you may apply for during the same year. However, please note that you may apply for this grant even if you have already applied for one of our undirected project grants in 2021, and that you may apply for the same or different research concepts. However, if you are applying for several project grants with the same research concept, and several are awarded, you will need to choose only one of them.
Table: Grants you may apply for simultaneously Opens in new window.
What requirements apply if I already have a grant from the Swedish Research Council?
There are certain restrictions if you are the project leader of an ongoing grant, that is to say where the grant period (payment period from the Swedish Research Council) overlaps the grant period of the grant the application relates to. Please note that the availability period, that is to say the time during which you have the right to use your grant, is normally longer than the grant period. You can find information about the requirements for your ongoing grant in the “Approval of terms and conditions” you received from the Swedish Research Council.
The table below shows information and restrictions for the grants you may apply for if you already have an ongoing grant. Please note that if you are the project leader for an ongoing project grant, this must have a different focus and a different project concept for you to be able to apply. If you are the project leader for an ongoing research environment grant, you may submit an application under this call, provided that the project grant application is not part of the research environment grant.
Table: Grants you may apply for if you have an ongoing grant Opens in new window.
Note: If you have been the project leader for previous grants from the Swedish Research Council that have ended, final financial reports for all of these must have been submitted within the permitted time frame in order for you to apply for a new grant. Please contact your administrating organisation if you are unsure whether all your final reports have been submitted.
What applies for applications to or grants from other funding bodies?
If your application to the Swedish Research Council relates to the same project concept as a grant you have already been awarded by, or are applying for to another funding body, please describe this.
Participating researchers
You can include up to 6 participating researchers in your application. Participating researchers are other researchers with a doctoral degree or equivalent competence, whose scientific competence will be crucial for the implementation of the planned research. They do not have to be employed by a Swedish HEI.
Participating researchers shall provide the necessary information themselves in Prisma, and upload these to the application. Any further collaborating partners and their roles shall be described in the research plan (please see instructions under “Research plan” below).
Costs and grant amounts
You can apply for a grant for all types of project-related costs, such as:
- salaries (including your own salary), however no more than corresponding to the person’s activity level in the project
- premises
- running costs (such as consumables, travel including stays at research facilities, publication costs and minor equipment)
- depreciation costs.
Grants must not be used for scholarships. If a doctoral student participates, project funds may not be paid out as salary during teaching or other departmental duties.
The minimum amount you can apply for is 400 000 SEK per year, including indirect costs. The maximum amount you can apply for is 1 700 000 SEK per year.
Grant period
You may apply for a grant for a minimum of 1 year and a maximum of 4 years, starting in January 2022. The first payment will be made no earlier than December 2021.
For this call, the project period shall be a maximum of 3 years under normal circumstances. If your proposed project cannot be completed within a 3-year period, you may apply for 4 years. You must then specifically justify the need for a fourth project year under the heading “Time plan and implementation” in the research plan.
Please refer to the application form in Prisma in parallel with reading the instructions below, which describe the call-specific content of the application. More information on what to do in practical terms is available in our Guide for applicants.
Language
Foreign experts are involved in the scientific assessment of the applications. To ensure fair and equitable assessment and efficient processing, please therefore complete your application in English.
Sections of the application
The application form includes the following tabs:
- Descriptive information
- Research description
- Budget and research resources
- Publications
- Administrating organisation
- Participants
- CV
The information we request under each tab is described below.
Descriptive information
Abstract
In the abstract, please describe in brief the following:
- What is to be done: purpose and aims
- How the research will be carried out: project organisation, time plan and scientific methods
- What is important about the planned research
The abstract shall provide a summary picture of the purpose and implementation of the research. Please use wording to ensure persons with another subject specialisation can understand the information.
The description may cover a maximum of 1 500 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately one third of an A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.
Popular science description
Describe the project in such a way that a person who is not a researcher can understand it. Do this by answering the following questions:
- What is the project about?
- Why is it important to research this?
- In what way may the new knowledge be important?
The text must be in Swedish and cover a maximum of 2 000 characters including blank spaces. The popular science description is important when we inform about the research funded by the Swedish Research Council.
Specific area
If your project covers research relating to cyber and information security, please state so here.
Research description
Ethical considerations
Describe the ethical issues raised by your project or corresponding. You must also describe how you plan to address ethical dilemmas that may arise. Please justify why the research should be carried out against the background of the ethical issues you have identified. How do your research questions and expected results measure up in relation to the ethical issues? Please also state whether the research involves any handling of personal data, or experiments on animals or human subjects. If no ethical issues are raised, please justify this.
The justification may cover a maximum of 4 000 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately one A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.
Research plan
The research plan shall be forward-looking and consist of a brief but complete description of the research task. It shall cover a maximum of 10 page-numbered A4 pages in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing and 2.5 cm margins, including references and any images.
The research plan must include the following headings and information, listed in the following order:
- Purpose and aims: State the overall purpose and specific aims of the research project.
- State-of-the-art: Summarise briefly the current research frontier within the field or area covered by the project. State key references.
- Significance and scientific novelty: Describe briefly how the project relates to previous research within the area, and the impact the project may have in the short and long term. Describe also how the project moves forward or innovates the current research frontier.
- Preliminary and previous results: Describe briefly your own previous research and pilot studies within the research area that make it probable that the project will be feasible. If no preliminary results exist, please state this. State also whether the project contributes further to research and scientific results from a grant awarded previously by the Swedish Research Council.
- Project description: Describe the project design under the following headings:
- Theory and method: Describe the underlying theory and the methods to be applied in order to reach the project goal.
- Time plan and implementation: Describe summarily the time plan for the project during the grant period, and how the project will be implemented.
- Project organisation: Clarify how you and any participating researchers will contribute to the implementation of the project. Explain in particular how the time allocated by you (that is, your activity level) as project leader is suitable for the task, including the relationship with your other research undertakings. Describe and explain the competences and roles of the participating researchers in the project, and also any other researchers or equivalent who are important for the implementation of the project.
Provide the following information also. If a heading is not relevant to your application, please state this under the heading.
- Equipment: Describe the basic equipment you and your team have at your disposal for the project.
- Need for research infrastructure: Specify the project’s need for international and national research infrastructure. In the first instance, you should use the research infrastructures supported by the Swedish Research Council, Opens in new window. which are open to all. If you choose to use other infrastructure instead, please justify this need (also applies for local research infrastructure).
- International and national collaboration: Describe your own and the team’s collaboration with foreign and Swedish researchers and research teams. State whether you contribute to or refer to international collaboration in your research.
- Other applications or grants: If you are applying for or intend to apply for other grants from the Swedish Research Council, please clarify the relationship between the projects. This applies also if you are receiving ongoing grants from the Swedish Research Council with grant periods that wholly or partly overlap with the grant you are now applying for. You should also justify why you are submitting one or several further applications. Describe also the relationship with other applications to or grants from other funding bodies for the same project concept (from you or another researcher).
- Independent line of research: If you are working or will be working in a larger group, please clarify how your project relates to the other projects in the group. If you are continuing a project that was wholly or partly started during your doctoral or postdoc studies, you must also describe the relationship between your project and the research of your former supervisor.
Budget and research resources
Project personnel
State the activity level (per cent of a full-time equivalent) of all personnel active within the project, that is to say yourself, any other researchers and other personnel. Please also state the salary you are applying for, for yourself and/or other personnel active within the project, both as a percentage of a full-time salary and as actual annual amounts (including social security contributions). Please state the amounts in Swedish krona, rounded to the nearest 1 000 SEK.
Other costs
Describe any other costs of the project (premises costs, running costs and depreciation costs). Please state the amounts in Swedish krona, rounded to the nearest 1 000 SEK.
You may include depreciation costs for equipment to be used in the project, provided that:
- the equipment has an economic life of at least three years
- the equipment has an acquisition value above a certain amount
- the need cannot be satisfied through use of national or international infrastructure supported by the Swedish Research Council and thereby open to all.
You may only include the proportion of depreciation costs that corresponds to the use of the equipment in the proposed project, and you may not include depreciation costs for equipment that is wholly funded by other grants. Please contact your administrating organisation for information about what is included in local research infrastructure, acquisition values or how to calculate depreciation costs.
Total cost of the project
Prisma will automatically add up your budget items in a table. The total amount you are applying for shall also include indirect costs. You will have to add these to the table yourself. Here you can also add any additional costs that the project entails (for which you are not seeking funding under this call).
Please contact your administrating organisation if you have any questions about what constitutes indirect and direct costs.
Justification of the budget applied for
Justify briefly each cost applied for in your budget. The description may cover a maximum of 4 000 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately one A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.
Other funding
Please state your or any other researcher’s funding for the project over and above what is applied for in this application. Please state the amounts in Swedish krona, rounded to the nearest 1 000 SEK.
Publications
Applicant’s publication list
Please attach your publication list drawn up according to the headings and information below. The list shall cover a maximum of 5 page-numbered A4 pages in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing and 2.5 cm margins.
Sort the publications under each heading in reverse chronological order, so that the latest publication is at the top of the list. Please only include articles or equivalent that are published or accepted for publication at the time of applying. The author name order shall be identical to that of the published work. The application cannot be supplemented with publications after the deadline for the call.
1. Selection of publications: List the 10 publications of greatest importance to your application. Describe how you contributed to each publication, and its relevance to the research project described (maximum 4 lines per publication). Highlight your name in bold in the author list.
2. Relevant publications from 2013–2021: In this part, the publications listed under Item 1 shall also be included if they have been published during the period in question. Sort the publications, with your name highlighted in bold in the author list, under each heading (publication type) in the following order:
- Peer-reviewed original articles
- Peer-reviewed conference contributions, the results of which are not included in other publications
- Peer-reviewed edited volumes
- Research review articles
- Peer-reviewed books and book chapters
- Other publications including popular science books/presentations
Participating researchers’ publication lists
Attach all participating researchers’ publications lists joined up into one file. The list for each researcher shall include the 10 publications that are the most relevant to the research described, and shall cover a maximum of 1 A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing and 2.5 cm margins. The name of the researcher in question shall be highlighted in bold and also be included in the page header of each list.
Please only include articles or equivalent that are published or accepted for publication at the time of applying. The author name order shall be identical to that of the published work. The application cannot be supplemented with publications after the deadline for the call.
The publications shall be of the types: Peer-reviewed original articles, conference contributions, edited volumes, research review articles, books and book chapters, and other publications including popular science books/presentations.
Administrating organisation
Please state the administrating organisation and project site.
Participants
Here you as applicant may invite other participating researchers and administrators to your application.
CV
Under this tab, please upload your relevant CV information from your personal account in Prisma. Any participating researchers must upload their own CV information to the application.
The following information (where available) must always be included in each CV:
- Education: First, second and third cycle higher education and specialist degrees.
- Work: Current employment (including employment form) and longer relevant employment held, postdoctoral visits (also included as employment if relevant), research exchanges relevant to the research described and any longer interruptions in the research that have impacted on your opportunity to gain merit as a researcher.
- Merits and awards: Docentship/associate professorship, supervisees (postdoctoral and doctoral students; state the number of persons in each category and list the names of the up to 10 most relevant to you), up to 10 of your most relevant grants awarded in competition, up to 10 of your most relevant prizes and awards, and up to 20 other merits relevant to the application.
- Intellectual property rights: For example, patents and open access computer programs developed by you; state up to 10 of your most relevant.
Scientific quality is the fundamental criterion when the Swedish Research Council allocates grants to research. Your application is evaluated in competition with the other applications on the basis of the following evaluation criteria.
Evaluation process
Your application for project grant for research into societal security, including cyber and information security, is evaluated by an interdisciplinary review panel where the members are international researchers.
At least three members review and grade your application individually. The entire review panel then meets at two review panel meetings during the fall to discuss and prioritise the applications, and finally to make a proposal for a decision to the Scientific Council for the Humanities and Social Science.
Review panel Opens in new window.
In order to enable more in-depth discussions of applications of higher quality that have a reasonable chance of being funded, the applications that received the lowest grades from the panel members at their first meeting, are not discussed in detail at the second meeting. Following the grant decision, all applications receive a final statement stating that includes the review panel’s grading of the application. The applications that have been discussed in more detail at the panel’s second meeting receive an individual final statement which, in addition to the grades, also contains a summary of the review panel’s discussion and joint assessment of the scientific quality of the application.
Evaluation criteria and guiding questions
The evaluation of the scientific quality of your application is made based on four basic criteria (Scientific quality of the proposed research, Novelty and originality, Merits of the applicant, Feasibility). The purpose of using several components is to achieve a multi-faceted evaluation. The criteria are assessed on a seven-grade scale, except for feasibility, which is assessed on a three-grade grade scale.
For each criterion, there are guiding questions to support the panel members’ evaluation of your application. These can also function as guidance for you when you write your application.
Scientific quality of the proposed research (1–7)
Strengths and weaknesses of the project’s question and methodology, including potential for future scientific activities.
Guiding questions:
- To what extent are the design of the project and its questions of the highest scientific quality?
- To what extent is the project description sufficiently clear and systematic, for example in its definition of the research problem, its theoretical basis, and the summary of previous results within the research area?
- To what extent is the proposed research design suitable for achieving the aims of the project?
- To what extent are the methods for any data collection and analysis well described and suitable?
- To what extent is the project relevant to knowledge about societal security?
Novelty and originality (1–7)
Guiding questions:
- To what extent does the project have the potential to increase knowledge significantly within the research area (examples are new concepts and theories, approaches and methods, and/or new data)?
- To what extent does the project show a clear progression and new thinking in relation to previous research?
- What potential does the project have for scientific and societal impact?
Merits of the applicant (1–7)
The merits of the applicant are always evaluated in relation to the applicant’s career age and to the research task.
Guiding questions:
- To what extent do the project participants have sufficient research experience and expertise within the area the application relates to?
- To what extent have the project participants displayed an ability for independent and creative scientific work?
- How good are the project participants’ scientific production, impact and other merits in a national and international perspective, in relation to the research area and the applicant’s career age?
- To what extent do the project participants have the relevant and supplementary competence required to carry out the research task?
- To what extent does the applicant (in the event the application includes doctoral students) have any experience of supervising doctoral students?
Feasibility (1–3)
Guiding questions:
- To what extent are the project’s staffing, work allocation and time plan realistic?
- Is there access to materials, equipment, research infrastructures and other resources required for the implementation of the project?
- Have the permits required to implement the project been obtained? If not, please state how such permits are being applied for, and how likely it is that these permits will be obtained.
Overall grade (1–7)
The above subsidiary criteria are weighed together into an overall grade, which reflects the review panel’s joint evaluation of the application’s scientific quality.