DINÂMIA’CET – Iscte, Centre for the Study of Socioeconomic Change and the Territory is an Iscte Research Unit which combines fundamental and applied research on economic, social and cultural topics. It carries out advanced international research systematically grounded on interdisciplinarity. With the aim of framing a new approach to sustainable development, our research seeks to contribute to the understanding of the contemporary world through the analysis of the contexts, the actors and the consequences of change, with a focus on institutional frameworks, and through extensive recourse to comparative approaches. Devoting special attention to the dynamics and changes of the Portuguese society, the researchers of DINÂMIA’CET-Iscte are engaged in contributing to the design of the future, and, when considered appropriate (e.g. to promote environmental sustainability, social cohesion and democracy), do not hesitate to expressly endorse a normative approach.

 

In order to conduct this mission, the Centre mobilizes a plural array of theoretical and methodological resources guided by a common core purpose: to understand the nature of the dynamics underlying the socioeconomic and territorial changes, their genesis in the inter-play between collective public and private actors in different domains (e.g. markets, territorial communities, public spaces), as well as their impact, in particular in spatial terms (landscapes, morphology).

 

DINÂMIA’CET-Iscte gathers researchers from a wide range of academic backgrounds (economics, sociology, law, architecture, regional and urban planning, anthropology, geography, management, quantitative methods, etc.). It has three research groups:

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Innovation and Labour

Cities and Territories

Governance, Economy and Citizenry

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D’C also seeks to take full advantage of the theoretical and methodological correspondences existing between them. Three Integrating Thematic Lines (ITL) were defined in 2013. A survey of the individual working programmes of D’C members carried out in 2017 confirmed the accuracy of this device and allowed to improve its coherence and its adequacy in relation to the Horizon 2020 Programme.

 

ITL are light structures aiming at stimulate contacts between researchers, between projects, and between Research Groups with a view to the setting up of cross-cutting initiatives, from working sessions to the design of research projects. They are conceived as flexible, likely to be adapted, on the middle run, both the social demand and to research currently carried out by D’C. ITL have no members, only a team of designated facilitators (Dinamizadores) and a general coordination (2020: Assunção Gato & Pierre Guibentif). The aim is to link most initiatives of D’C to one or more ITL. The current (2020-2024) three D’C ITL are:

 

Innovation and Transition to Sustainable Societies

Regulatory and Governance Challenges for Complex Societies

Creative and Participative Lives in Empowered Societies

 

A first opportunity to test the accuracy of these lines was a set of Paper Discussion Sessions that took place in November 2018.