Unlocking the Fifth Freedom: Science Europe Response to the Call for Evidence on the ERA Act

Science Europe has submitted its response to the European Commission’s Call for Evidence on the upcoming European Research Area (ERA) Act. The ERA Act represents a major opportunity to create a true single market for research and innovation – often referred to as the “fifth freedom” – by strengthening research excellence, shared values, and cross-border collaboration.

In its response, Science Europe makes the following recommendations: 

Support research excellence: The ERA Act should establish a level playing field across Europe, and strengthen the legal foundation for the full deployment of a single borderless market for research and innovation.

Core Values: It must safeguard academic freedom, institutional autonomy, equality, diversity, inclusion, and sustainability. A separate legislative proposal on academic freedom may be needed.

Increase investment: Progress towards the EU target of 3% of GDP for research and innovation remains slow and uneven across countries. The Act must incentivise higher national investments, with at least 1.25% of GDP from public sources.

Advance research culture: Legislation should create an enabling environment for open science, research assessment reform, mobility, environmental sustainability, and secure but open international collaboration.

Strengthen implementation: The Act should link to existing EU legislation (e.g. Open Data, Digital Services Act) and rely on established governance structures such as the ERA Forum, avoiding unnecessary new bodies.

As the Act represents a new and bold step towards a more integrated European Research Area, evidence-based decision making from the early stages will be crucial to achieving success.