I am delighted to be nominated for the EATCS Council, on which I have served for a full term now.

ICALP

Looking back at my election statement from 2017, it is dominated by my ambition to increase the quality of ICALP, primarily by giving ICALP a steering committee.

I am happy that I can just write DONE next to this action point, see https://eatcs.org/index.php/committees. The ICALP steering committee turned out to be a complete success. I am extremely proud of what we’ve done with ICALP, including reacting very quickly to the COVID pandemic in 2019–2020. Mostly the success is due to the incredibly competent and pleasant people working inside the committee (ably headed by Anca Muscholl), and the amazing atmosphere that continues to permeate the entire TCS community.

Publication models

I worry about the publication and review model in the sciences, including in TCS, and have spent a lot of time involved in the advisory board of TheoretiCS, tirelessly headed by Thomas Schwentick. TheoretiCS will be an open access journal of very high quality covering all of TCS; having the journal tightly integrated into the community is a core value, and I serve as the representative of ICALP.

This has been very long process that I am extremely excited about, and I’m proud of what we’ve done so far.

TCS and the sciences

My 2017 election statement includes a passage about “ how the mathematical discipline of theoretical computer science can interact with its surroundings”.

This remains a central question for me, but a much harder one than helping to build steering committees or journals. I had the honour of serving as chair of the Swedish Research Council’s panel for (all of) computer science in 2019, 2020, and 2021, which has solidified by understanding of both CS and the role of TCS inside CS.

Core principles

I am a signatory of the open letter to CACM about core principles of scientific inquiry and stand by the values elucidated therein. I am cognisant of the fact that academia, including TCS, are divided on this issue (see the excellent rebuttal of our position by David Karger), and want to make my position clear as part of this election statement.