On Monday 11th April WISERD Co-Director Professor Paul Chaney addressed a research community building conference at Cardiff SWALEC Stadium organised by Cardiff University’s new Crime and Security Research Institute (CSRI).
This engagement activity is part of ongoing work to develop social science collaboration in Wales. Under the Directorship of Professor Martin Innes, the CSRI will conduct research that generates new evidence and insights to help reduce crime and increase security. Its research programme is organised around four key themes: behaviour change, data to decision, prevention and protection, and neighbourhood to national security. The aim is to deliver research-led solutions to the local and global challenges associated with effective crime and security management.
Professor Chaney outlined potential avenues for future research collaboration between WISERD and the CSRI across the key areas of WISERD’s work – including Civil Society, Education, Health, Wellbeing & Social Care, Economic & Social Inequalities, Localities, and Data & Methods.
Topics discussed included public policy research and devolution; analysis of patterns and processes of representation; citizen trust and state institutions and services; analysis of crime prevention, social capital and community engagement in the context of an ageing population – and interdisciplinary perspectives on crime, deprivation and inequality.
Current CSRI projects include: – The Open Source Communications, Analytics and Research (OSCAR) Development Centre that is investigating how the ‘information age’ is changing the operating environment for policing and community safety providers, and the implications that flow from this; Tackling radicalisation in dispersed societies funded by the European Commission to explore how the risks of radicalisation can be reduced; and, Mapping services for victims of crime in south Wales that aims to provide a more evaluative component of the quality and delivery of victim services.