Research Group in Ethics, Social Theory
and Epistemology of Social Sciences

The Research Group in Ethics, Social Theory and Epistemology of the Social Sciences (GREECS) is a team of researchers working on central issues in the social sciences and philosophy. The group is committed to an interdisciplinary approach in political philosophy, ethics, sociology, economics, history and epistemology of the social sciences. Its multi-faceted research is unified by a common methodological, social-theoretical and philosophical-political perspective that emphasizes historical, institutional and historical-conceptual analysis of economic, social, political and ethical problems.

GREECS’ research activities can be classified along the following overlapping lines of research: republicanism; democracy; political economy; capitalism; property rights and commons; work and social movements; inequality, poverty and basic income; history of social and political concepts; fiduciary relationships; methodology and epistemology of the social sciences; and social epidemiology.

The members of GREECS carry out individual or joint research on the subjects within their competence, some of which involve international collaborations. The activities of the members include public colloquia with invited researchers and the organization of conferences and workshops. The members of GREECS also engage in activities of knowledge transfer to public institutions, associations, political parties, foundations and ethics committees.

GREECS participates in the Postgraduate Diploma in “Analysis of Capitalism: Republican-socialist Tools” (University of Barcelona) which, in different formats, is being taught since 2011. The group is also involved in the edition of the weekly electronic journal Sin Permiso, founded in 2006.

GREECS was founded in 1998, and has been oficially recognized as a consolidated research group by the Generalitat de Catalunya since 2014. The latest such recognition was received for the cicle 2017-2021 with grant identifier 2017-SGR-223.