A conversation still in motion: universities, security and dual-use research

A few months ago, a colleague at KIT asked me a direct question: are we now going to start building weapons?

My answer was no - and remains no.

But the question itself tells you something about how quickly the conversation around security and defence research has shifted, even if, in day-to-day scientific practice, that shift has so far been more about language than about substance.

I say this carefully, because the debate deserves nuance. Germany's historical caution about military-related research is not a relic to be brushed aside. It reflects a genuine and serious commitment to open science and academic freedom, one that many of my colleagues hold with real conviction. I respect that position, and I do not think it is wrong to take these questions seriously.

At the same time, I think we have to be honest about where research at an institution like KIT actually sits. A large part of what we do – work on drones, new materials, sensors, artificial intelligence and cybersecurity – has potential dual-use implications. We have simply not always spoken about it that way.

What has changed is not so much our research, but our willingness to discuss its possible consequences openly and to reflect carefully on the boundaries set by our values.

This is why I believe we need closer dialogue between universities, the technology sector and the ministries responsible for defence - not so that universities take on a different mission, but so that these questions can be addressed responsibly, and with appropriate frameworks, rather than left to rhetoric alone.

At KIT, this means engaging where our expertise can genuinely contribute, while being clear about where research needs different governance once it moves toward application.

We remain, first and foremost, a university, committed to open inquiry.

The particular structure of the German research landscape helps here: KIT combines a research university with a national research centre and when projects require the kind of protections or industrial partnership that goes beyond what a university should provide, we work with partners built for that purpose, such as the Fraunhofer Institutes.

None of this is a finished position.

It is a conversation still in motion - in Germany, and across Europe's universities of science and technology - and I think it is one we are right to have openly, with all its tensions, rather than avoid out of caution.

That, to me, is the conversation CESAER's Members are well placed to help shape.

Jan S. Hesthaven

President of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology