ET and EEMCS Researchers Join Major NWO KIC Programme

The Dutch Research Council (NWO) has awarded funding to the project ‘Towards a National Centre for Shaping the Future of Physical Work’. The funding is part of the KIC Long-term programmes.

UT researchers involved in the project are Prof. dr. Vanessa Evers, dr.ing. Gwen Englebienne (both EEMCS), dr.ir. Cristina Zaga, and Prof.dr.ir. Mascha van der Voort (both ET). Ensuring decent physical work in vital sectors with mounting labour shortages is complex and requires a National Centre for Shaping the Future of Physical Work. Within this project, researchers will team up with public and private partners, roboticists, designers, social scientists, and ethicists to create technical, social and organisational innovations, with and for workers.

Researchers from ET will be involved in the research on (re)design of worker-robot relations and will lead the work package on transdisciplinary collaboration. Researchers from EEMCS are involved in research on social robots. 

I and the HCD team will be co-leading a work package focused on developing Transdisciplinary Methodology for the Future of Physical Work(ers). It is an incredible opportunity for physical work oriented toward solidarity. We will draw on the decennial experience of the HCD group in transdisciplinary collaboration and explore ways to co-imagine automated technology that is collectively owned, locally governed, and designed to serve social rather than extractive ends.

Researchers from EEMCS and ET will, through this project, establish one of the first learning communities in the Netherlands dedicated to integrative knowledge creation, public engagement, and achieving tangible change in this domain. Ultimately, it aims to become a cornerstone for spaces that foster joyful resistance to the current status quo, enabling social justice, meaningful work, and power-aware labor relations within a network of solidarity shaped by multiple stakeholders rather than solely by those in positions of power.