Call for Participants: EU Election Benchmarks for Archaeology and Heritage Protection 2024-2029

Sophie Hüglin & Jean-Olivier Gransard-Desmond (Chairs of the Political Strategies Community -PSC)

The next European Parliament election will take place in 2024. Several EAA Communities have agreed to cooperate in producing election benchmarks on archaeology and heritage protection.

During election campaigns, benchmarks are a highly effective way to make politicians and political parties aware of archaeology and heritage protection. Before the election date, parties represented in the current EU Parliament are asked for statements regarding a set of burning questions. Their answers are widely published and especially made available to voters with an interest in archaeology in order to aid them with their decision in the voting booth. After the election, these self-set benchmarks will help to hold politicians accountable for the actions that they promised to take while on campaign.

Already for the last EU election in 2019, a set of questions was prepared and sent out to politicians. At the EAA Community Assembly in Budapest it was decided to repeat this project and work on topics for 2024. Under the coordination of the Political Strategies Community, the benchmark project is already well underway. However, it is still open to archaeologists and heritage professionals who would like to get engaged, either with the formulation of topics or on a national level when the political parties are being contacted and evaluations produced.

The project has three phases – 1) rewriting texts, 2) contacting politicians and finally 3) evaluating and redistributing the answers. Currently, we are in phase one. The 2019-2024 benchmarks will be revised and updated up until September. To this end, we meet monthly and discuss the following topics:

a) Protecting Historic Landscapes in Planning Processes
b) Integrating Cultural Heritage in EU Common Agricultural Policy
c) Preventing Illicit Trade in Antiquities (revised)
d) Facilitating Transnational Mobility (revised)
e) Open Licensing for Images of Cultural Heritage from Public & Non-profit Institutions

Together with the relevant Communities and experts within the EAA, we look forward five years from the current situation and discuss proposals to drop old topics and take up new ones. For example, with the help of the Community for Climate Change & Heritage (CCH) we will integrate measures mitigating climate change into topic a) Protecting Historic Landscapes in Planning Processes.

Last time the benchmarks were sent in English to political groups on the EU level and – after being translated into the respective national languages – these were then disseminated to national parties with seats in the European Parliament. With the help of engaged EAA members, we were able to reach out to politicians and the public in Austria, Germany, Lithuania, and Spain. This time we intend to extend the number of EU member states and are looking for individuals who would take on translation and formal communication with national political parties.

If you are interested in contributing to the benchmark project, please subscribe to the Political Strategies Community or contact the authors. We meet online every first Monday of the month at 18:30 CET on the platform https://meet.jit.si/EEA_PSC_Meetings. The next meeting dates will be February 6, March 6, and April 3, when we will discuss topics a), b) and e). At the PSC meeting and the Community Assembly in Belfast on August 30, we will present the benchmarks for 2024-2029 and start the second phase of the project in which political groups and parties will be contacted. We hope that you will join us.

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New editor-in-chief of Archeologické rozhledy and news for authors

The Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague would like to announce that Václav Vondrovský has been appointed the new editor-in-chief of the journal Archeologické rozhledy, as of 31 January, 2023. The Institute of Archaeology also expresses its gratitude and acknowledgements to the previous editor-in-chief Martin Ježek for his outstanding efforts for more than 20 years.

Archeologické rozhledy is one of the oldest archaeological journals in Czechia. It is an Open Access peer-reviewed journal which has been published since 1949, and which has recently been covered by international databases like WOS, SCOPUS, ERIH PLUS and many others. In four issues per year, it presents original archaeological research, topical reviews, discussions, and reviews of new archaeological literature. Papers are published in English, Czech and Slovak.

Archeologické rozhledy aims to present a wide range of original archaeological research focused on Central Europe or which has relevance for archaeology in this area. Published articles cover the full spectrum of topics regardless of chronological period or methodological approach. The journal welcomes reports on significant archaeological discoveries set within a wider context, as well as interdisciplinary and science-based research and discussions or reviews that reconsider key issues of Central European archaeology.

The journal has its own website with an archive, as well as a new editorial system, where new papers can be submitted. If you are interested in publishing in the journal, please prepare your submission in alignment with the new author guidelines. You can also follow Archeologické rozhledy on Facebook and Twitter.

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Join the 2023 European Archaeology Days!

The European Archaeology Days will take place on 16, 17 and 18 June 2023. How can you participate?

First of all, you need to come up with a line-up of specific activities for the EADs, taking care to fulfil a certain number of criteria: opening up the places where archaeology is done, furthering the interaction between archaeology professionals and the public, offering up different activities (i.e. a change from the usual programming) which appeal to those not familiar with archaeology, encouraging children and young people to participate and—in particular—by planning activities for families or school groups on Fridays.

The next step is to register and publish your agenda on the website (journees-archeologie.fr) via the organiser account you will have opened on the page for your country. Registration will open on 13 February. To facilitate participation in the EADs, we provide communication tools for the organisers, which they can download via their account. We also provide a ‘Guide for Event Organisers’ to help you put together and create awareness about your programme. Should you have questions, you are welcome to contact Pascal Ratier at pascal.ratier@inrap.fr.

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