The West Balkan Competence Centre of the SZTE IKIKK (Centre of Excellence for Interdisciplinary Research, Development and Innovation of the University of Szeged) launches cooperative PhD research with five regional universities. The participants discussed the details of the cooperation at an international conference held in the Main building of the University of Szeged on the 4th December 2023.
The West Balkan Competence Centre, whose aim is to create an international consortium spanning across borders, is part of the Centre of Excellence for Interdisciplinary Research, Development and Innovation of the University of Szeged, namely of the Cluster of Humanities and Social Sciences.
A total of five lecturers and six PhD students from six institutions of five regional states visited Szeged with the aim of identifying topics in the fields of social sciences, economics and law in which the SZTE and its Western Balkan partner institutions could start joint research from the beginning of next year. Three faculties of the University are involved in the joint research: the Faculty of Law and Political Sciences, the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, and the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.
The guests from the University of Belgrade, the University of Podgorica, the University of Pristina, the American College of Skopje, the University of Tirana and the University of Novi Sad were welcomed by Prof. Dr. Krisztina Karsai, Head of the Institute of Criminal Sciences (Faculty of Law and Political Sciences), her PhD student Giola Cami, Dr. Edit Soós, Associate Professor of the Department of Political Sciences (Faculty of Law and Political Sciences), Dr. Ágnes Matuska, the Vice Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Dr. András Máté-Tóth, Professor of the Department of Religious Studies (Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences), and his PhD students, Rita Figus-Illinyi and Krisztina Wimmer, and Dr. Péter Vukman, Associate Professor of the Institute of History (Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences).
The conference was opened by Prof. Dr. Péter Zakar, Vice-Rector for International and Public Relations and Professional manager of the Cluster of Humanities and Social Sciences, while the Chair of the event was Dr. Péter Kruzslic, Adjunct professor of the International and Regional Studies Institute (Faculty of Law and Political Sciences).
In the morning of the day very rich of various academic content, representatives of the partner institutions, together with PhD students, presented their ongoing research topics in a plenary session. After the lunch break, two workshops were held with colleagues from Szeged, in which together, they were able to explore the points of connection that could be used as a basis for joint research work.
On the long run, the universities plan to start joint international courses and trainings. In addition, they envisaged joint publications and the launch of a new journal as well.
The topic was discussed earlier here: https://u-szeged.hu/ikikk/news/news-archive-221109/2023-october/international-workshop
IKIKKinfo
Photo: Anna Bobkó
