GLOBUS critically assesses the EU’s impact on justice in a global system characterised by uncertainty, risk and ambiguity. GLOBUS defines a new research agenda for the study of the EU’s global role. This agenda directs attention to underlying political and structural challenges to global justice that are prior to the distributive problem, as well as to the fact that what is just is contested both by theorists and policy makers. GLOBUS provides in depth knowledge of how the EU proceeds to promote justice within the specific fields of climate change, trade, development, asylum/migration and security while also speaking to the key horizontal issues of gender and human rights within each of these fields. Rather than focusing on a single dimension GLOBUS develops three different conceptions of justice. This nuanced conceptual scheme allows GLOBUS to address the multifaceted challenge of justice, and to specify the EU’s real impact. GLOBUS takes heed of the reality of “the foreign will” through intense engagement with partners outside Europe. This provides a ‘reality check’ of the limits and potential for the EU’s future place in a multi-polar order. The three conceptions of justice as non-dominance, as impartiality and as mutual recognition all have limitations as they prioritise some challenges to global justice over others. These limitations are important in order to empirically discern inhibiting factors for global political justice– such as power, unequal competences and the prevailing ‘system of states’ – as well as in order to specify how the EU contributes to justice. In order to develop a feasible model of justice promotion, we return to theory when data is collected and revise and amend the analytical model. We further factor in the viewpoints and experience of practitioners and stakeholders, GLOBUS provides policy-relevant recommendations that take into consideration ideal requirements while at the same time not losing sight of the realities of power.

PILLARS offers a three-pillars framework that includes: (1) A comprehensive and empirically solid account of the combined effect of (i) past waves of automation technologies, (ii) recent trends of international fragmentation of production in Global Value Chains (GVCs) and (iii) industrial transformation of European regions on EU labour markets, in terms of employment reconfiguration, skill mismatch and migration. (2) A comprehensive set of forecasting scenarios based on the impact assessment in (1) and projection of (i) industries’ future exposure to emerging automation technologies; (ii) EU regional industrial transformation and (de)specialisation; and (iii) functional reallocation of workers along GVC and migration flows; and (iv) potential skill mismatch resulting from projections of skill demand and supply. (3) A systematic evaluation of current labour market policies, based on smart specialisation, and training policies that allows identifying areas of success and directions to be mitigated. This will lead to proposing a coherent and cohesive policy roadmap that includes a battery of action in different policy areas (innovation, trade, education and training) to achieve Pathways to Inclusive Labour Markets. PILLARS’ ambition to contribute to assess current labour market policies and co-design a new generation of policies for the future of work will be fulfilled by a consortium of top scholars, including partners from Latin America and China; an enthusiastic, international, multidisciplinary stakeholder support to the potential of PILLARS; and a top notch academic advisory board.