Crafting the EOSC Rules of Participation
The Rules of Participation Working Group (RoP WG), chaired by Juan Bicarregui, has released the Rules of Participation for the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC). It is now available on the European Commission website. The RoP WG was assigned the task to define a minimal set of clear rules that specify the rights, obligations and accountability governing EOSC activities.
The RoP have therefore been formulated as a set of overarching top-level rules that are intended to be generally applicable and long-lived, together with a more detailed commentary on each rule that discusses the issues relevant to that rule. The RoP apply across the whole of EOSC and to all EOSC participants.
In drafting the RoP, the Working Group has assumed that the EOSC Association will adopt, and take responsibility for, the RoP from January 1, 2021. As EOSC grows, it will be necessary to monitor compliance with the RoP, and take action if required to ensure the rules are adopted. Moreover, it is expected that the RoP will need to be reviewed and updated as EOSC evolves.
In order to guide this evolution of the rules, the RoP WG has developed a document on ‘Ownership and evolution of RoP from 2021 onwards’, which proposes how the RoP should be managed through a standing EOSC RoP Board that is established as Body of the EOSC Association. This document is also available on the European Commission website.
An early draft of the EOSC RoP was the subject of a public consultation in the spring of 2020 and a second public draft, considering the input received during open consultation, was produced during the summer of that year. The final RoP were then developed drawing on discussion and feedback on that draft, with input from EOSC implementation projects and using proposals published by other EOSC Working Groups.
Whilst aspirational in places due to a number of policies and procedures that are still to be defined or agreed, EOSC RoP provide a clear set of principles to guide future participation in EOSC.
If you would like to get in touch regarding the EOSC RoP, please contact inform-rop-wg@eoscsecretariat.eu
