The establishment of transnational research councils can be observed as a result of science diplomacy.
Examples:
The Global Research Council is a virtual organisation, comprised of the heads of science and engineering funding agencies from around the world, dedicated to promote the sharing of data and best practices for high-quality collaboration among funding agencies worldwide. The worldwide growth of public support for research has presented an opportunity for countries large and small to work in concert across national borders. Cooperation and collaboration can enhance the quality of science, avoid unnecessary duplication, provide economies of scale, and address issues that can only be solved by working together. Research funding agencies have a responsibility to meet these objectives on behalf of the research communities.
The International Science Council (ISC) is a non-governmental organisation with a unique global membership that brings together 40 international scientific unions and associations and over 140 national and regional scientific organisations including academies and research councils. The ISC was created in 2018 as the result of a merger between the International Council for Science (ICSU) and the International Social Science Council (ISSC). It is the only international non-governmental organisation bringing together the natural and social sciences and the largest global science organisation of its type. The Council’s activities focus on three principal areas of work: (i) Science-for-policy to stimulate and support international scientific research and scholarship, and to communicate science that is relevant to international policy issues, (ii) Policy-for-science to promote developments that enable science to contribute more effectively to major issues in the international public domain, (iii) Scientific freedom and responsibility to defend the free and responsible practice of science.
Some councils are also set up for specific thematic areas, for example:
The International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) is an intergovernmental marine science organization, meeting societal needs for impartial evidence on the state and sustainable use of our seas and oceans. Its goal is to advance and share the scientific understanding of marine ecosystems and the services they provide and to use this knowledge to generate state-of-the-art advice for meeting conservation, management, and sustainability goals. ICES a network of more than 5,000 scientists from over 700 marine institutes in our 20 member countries and beyond. 1,500 scientists participate in its activities annually. Through strategic partnerships, ICES’s work in the Atlantic Ocean also extends into the Arctic, the Mediterranean Sea, the Black Sea, and the North Pacific Ocean.
Visit sites: https://www.globalresearchcouncil.org, https://council.science/ (ISC), https://www.ices.dk/Pages/default.aspx (ICES)
Keywords: Council, Cooperation among funding agencies, Science Advice, Publications, Global Commons, Events, Data, Tools, Training
