Application consultation

Gender and diversity dimensions are now considered a key quality criterion for third-party funding applications.

Both the German Research Foundation (DFG) and the EU Framework Program Horizon Europe require applicants to examine the relevance of these aspects to their research and, if applicable, to present them in a comprehensible manner in the application documents—regardless of the discipline.

Funding institutions thus expect all disciplines to assess the relevance of gender, either to integrate relevant dimensions and thus close gaps in research or to provide a comprehensible justification for its irrelevance. This not only promotes scientific excellence, but also underlines the requirement to make research relevant and useful for all parts of society.

This approach requires researchers to examine the relevance of gender and diversity as a matter of course and raises the question: How can gender and diversity be meaningfully examined and classified in the respective disciplinary context, even if a connection is not immediately apparent at first glance?