The Research Institute of the Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations assembles all research professors and doctoral students at the School. These researchers are divided into six different research groups recognized by the Catalonian Regional Government. Their work involves both basic research (associated with the academic world) and applied research (associated with industry and institutions).
Director of the Research Institute of the School of Communication and International Relations: Dr. Marçal Sintes Olivella.
The mission of the Research Institute is to contribute to the qualitative and quantitative advancement of research at the university.
The Institute's research activity focuses primarily, but always from a multidisciplinary perspective, on the revolution brought about by communication technologies and on how this revolution is changing people’s lives and communities within the context of globalization.
The Research Institute is the entity in charge of gathering, coordinating, supporting, and promoting the work of all researchers and research groups at the Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations at Ramon Llull University, as well as that of doctoral students and of those who are in the course of preparing their doctoral dissertation.
Our researchers work in six different research groups, all recognized by the Agency for Management of University and Research Grants (AGAUR), of the Catalonian Regional Government. Their work involves both basic research (linked to the academic world) and applied research (associated with the public administration, other research and innovation institutions, companies, and civil society organizations). Researchers have their own workplace at the Institute which is provided with all necessary equipment and services.
In addition, the Institute has three meeting rooms available for the research groups to use for creative development, debate, or for coordinating tasks concerning projects: the Co-creation & Thinking Hub (area R-1) and the Communications & Big Data Lab (area R-2). The third is the CreaRoom (area R-3) which is designed to host training sessions, conferences, and talks by experts or anyone who can contribute creative and inspiring ideas to the researchers.
The Research Institute of the Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations is structured around several technological vectors and digital activity axes, all of them coherent and closely linked to the undergraduate and graduate studies offered by the School of which it forms a part.
These vectors or axes share a common concern about how to respond to the enormous technological changes that are taking place in our societies; changes which are linked to the digital revolution mentioned above, and also to the phenomenon of globalization with all the opportunities it offers as well as all the associated risks, as for example, that of digital exclusion.
These digital vectors or axes also converge into a strong desire to serve society through knowledge transfer, internationalization, and an interdisciplinary and collaborative approach to research on technology. These vectors or axes are the following:
The purpose of this plan which will be developed within the Research Institute of the School of Communication and International Relations is, as mentioned above, to contribute to the qualitative and quantitative development of research and collaboration on part of the university as understood in the broadest and most comprehensive sense. This mission, therefore, is to be considered the main objective of the project.
As for the complementary objectives or secondary challenges addressed, these can be grouped into three large blocks, listed below, which will be developed in detail in section 3.4 on the creation of opportunities and generation of impact.
Our research has multiple quality guarantees. The six research groups in which FCRI Blanquerna researchers are integrated have been recognized by the Agency for the Management of University and Research Grants (AGAUR) of the Catalonian Regional Government.
The researchers at the Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations collaborate with a network of Catalan, Spanish, and international academic institutions, public administrations, and business sectors. In this regard, the axes which make up the foundation of Blanquerna's research stand within the scope of the Focus Areas established in Aristos Campus Mundus, a project promoted by the universities Ramon Llull, Deusto and Comillas. Since May 2010, these three universities constitute a Campus of International Excellence and have signed an advanced cooperation agreement with the American universities Georgetown, Boston College and Fordham. This strategic cooperation is committed to social, equitable, responsible, and sustainable innovation.
The research activity of the Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations is organized in six research groups, all recognized by the Agency for the Management of University and Research Grants (AGAUR) of the Catalonian Regional Government.
View teaching staff available to tutor and/or to direct a thesis.