Center for Digital Humanism Vienna founded

WU Vienna University of Economics and Business is founding the “Center for Digital Humanism (CDH) Vienna” together with the University of Vienna, the Vienna University of Technology, and Central European University. The joint limited liability company (GmbH) will be established on July 1, 2026, and the center will begin its operational work in the fall. The goal is to bring together research, practice, and societal dialogue on digital humanism and raise its international profile.

The Center for Digital Humanism Vienna will create a new joint platform in Vienna for interdisciplinary collaboration at the intersection of technology, society, and responsibility. The CDH Vienna intends to support collaborative research and practical projects, connect academia, business, politics, government, and civil society, and strengthen digital humanism through international collaborations, conferences, scholarly positions, and fellowship programs.

For WU, this involvement is particularly relevant because digital transformation encompasses more than just technological development. It is also transforming markets, organizations, work, competition, regulation, and social participation. Here, WU contributes its expertise in economics, the social sciences, and business law, especially when considering economic dynamics, responsibility, and social benefit together.

Focus on the Economic, Social, and Legal Consequences of Technological Development

WU Rector Rupert Sausgruber emphasizes: “Digital humanism poses the crucial question of what standards we want to use to shape technological development. For WU, this means: We want to help ensure that innovation is measured not only by efficiency and feasibility, but also by its economic, social, and legal consequences. The Center for Digital Humanism Vienna provides an important shared framework for this, spanning disciplines and institutions.”

New Impulses for Research, Teaching, and Knowledge Transfer

The CDH Vienna will open new avenues for WU in terms of interdisciplinary research, joint projects, teaching and training formats, Ph.D. activities, and events and knowledge transfer initiatives with partner universities and stakeholders from politics, business, and civil society. The researchers will remain based at the four partner universities while the CDH Vienna will assume a coordinating and networking role. Peter Knees, Professor of Computer Science at the Vienna University of Technology and UNESCO Chair for Digital Humanism, is the designated director.

WU can build on existing initiatives, such as the Vienna Doctoral College on Digital Humanism, and the projects „Fair OGD: Fair online group decision making“ and „Citizen PB: Citizen-centered democratic innovation: Understanding citizen preferences for participatory budgeting algorithms“ and the upcoming „Digital Democracy: Bridging Theory and Practice“ conference at WU. Additionally, the CDH aims to establish key connections with the Competence Center for Applied AI and Scientific Computing.