Cinderella lost? Barriers to the integration of energy Social Sciences and Humanities outside academia

It is now widely recognized that current energy challenges may be better addressed through the support of Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) expertise. However, the effective integration of SSH in the energy-related sectors is still hampered by a series of barriers. While these barriers have been studied in current inter and transdisciplinary projects within academic environments, this paper is aimed at exploring them outside the academia, where energy-SSH topics are developed via the different careers’ paths. Our analysis draws from a questionnaire/public discussion with one hundred policy workers, and of thirty interviews with stakeholders from business, NGOs and European Technology & Innovation Platforms. Results show that the integration of energy-SSH into policy and business can take place at several levels, from the employment of SSH-experts within teams to light use of outputs from SSH reports. Projects which seek interdisciplinarity may need to more fully evaluate and acknowledge the specific competencies required and possessed by SSH practitioners. Much of the potential for energy-SSH collaboration is still under-exploited, in part due to a lack of knowledge of the specific tools SSH can offer, the lack of salience given to SSH skills, and difficulties in measuring the efficacy of interdisciplinary and SSH-integration approaches.