Attention to ethical and social issues were part of the Human Brain Project’s work from the very beginning in 2013. Accordingly, a group of HBP researchers from the social sciences and the humanities created several structures and mechanisms and used various conceptual and empirical methods to develop activities and to identify, reflect upon, and manage the ethical and social issues raised by brain research, its outputs, and applications. With this collection of essays, we aim to present our work in an accessible format, with the ambition of sharing the research and its outputs with diverse stakeholder communities, including policymakers, civil society -and interest organisations, research, and expert communities outside our peer communities. The collection includes short essays by our HBP colleagues who describe and reflect on their work at different stages of our developmental history. In the process, they offer key findings, reflection points, and lessons learned