The Bridges Project aims to bring new insights from researchers and experts on human behaviour to the attention of policy-makers, politicians and activists, in order to help them work through some of the most sensitive and complex policy dilemmas facing open societies in Europe. The project encourages policy-makers to develop a more in-depth understanding of the new political landscape in order to help them diagnose public grievances more accurately and respond to what underlies them.
This publication is divided into two parts. The first illustrates some of the ways in which the Bridges Project has identified transmission mechanisms by which policy-makers, politicians and activists can be persuaded to adopt new insights. It further illustrates how these insights have been used to change policy and political strategy in many countries in Europe. The second part is a collection of essays written by members of the Bridges network, who are intellectuals and top researchers working across a number of disciplines – including cognitive neuroscience, social psychology, anthropology and psychoanalysis. Their findings have enabled us to create a set of tools that will allow policy-makers to gain new insights into the publics they serve, and uphold vital norms in European society.
