The CREST workshop series focuses on developing formal methods for reasoning about causation in software and hardware systems, as well as on the foundations of causal reasoning in the philosophy of science. Formal approaches for causal inference, fault localization, event explanation, accountability, and blame have been developed independently across multiple research communities, notably AI, concurrency, model-based diagnosis, software engineering, security engineering, and formal methods. Research on these topics has gained significant momentum in recent years. 

The main objective of CREST is to bring these communities together in order to enable discussions between researchers and practitioners from industry and academia on how causal inference and causal prediction can be performed and further developed. A further objective is to link to the foundations of causal reasoning in the philosophy of sciences and to causal reasoning performed in computer science and engineering. 

CREST 2026 will take place on July 24, 2026, as a satellite event of FLoC 2026.

Previous editions: CREST 2023, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, and 2016.

Call for Presentations

The goal of this workshop is to bring together researchers from different communities interested in causality, responsibility, and explanation, foster exchange among them, and provide a forum for presenting and discussing recent advances and new ideas in the field. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Languages and logics for causal specification and causal analysis

• Derivation of causal models (e.g., during runtime verification / observation)

• Actual causality in hybrid, cyber-physical and machine-learning-based systems

• Causality and agency attribution in AI systems

• Causality in socio-technical and legal systems

• Causal reasoning in security engineering

• Causality in accident analysis, safety cases and certification

• Fault ascription and blaming

• Accountability, explainability of algorithms and systems

• Causal models inference, cause mining

• Applications, implementations, tools and case studies of the above

Presentation proposals should be in the form of an extended abstract of up to three pages in LNCS format (not including references) and should be  submitted via HotCRP by May 1, 2026 (extended to May 5). Submissions can overlap with previously published work and will be judged based on their relevance to the topic of the workshop. The review process will be single blind. 

Important Dates

• Submission: May 1, 2026 AoE (extended to May 5)

• Notifications: May 10, 2026

• (Early-bird Conference Registration: May 15, 2026)

• Early-bird Workshop Registration: June 1, 2026

• Workshop Day: July 24, 2026

 Invited Speakers

Program 

09:00 - 09:30 Welcome
& Remembering Joseph Y. Halpern

09:30 - 10:30 Invited Talk by Sander Beckers
Title and Abstract: TBD

10:30 - 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 - 12:30 Contributed Presentations: 

• An Actual Causality Calculus for Process Algebra
  by Georgiana Caltais, Nadine Muller (University of Twente)

• Causal Models in LogiKEy
  by Luca Pasetto, Apostolos Tzimoulis (University of Luxembourg); Christoph Benzmüller (University of Bamberg & FU Berlin)

• A Concurrency-Theoretic Framework for Actual Causation
  by Julian Bradfield, Christian Odenwald (University of Edinburgh)

• Figuring Out The Reasons Behind the Rules we Follow
  by Houssam Abbas, Alena Makarova (Oregon State University)

• Unification and Explanation from a Causal Perspective
  by Christian J. Feldbacher-Escamilla (University of Cologne)

12:30 - 14:00 Lunch Break

14:00 - 15:00 Invited Talk by Christel Baier

Title and Abstract: TBD

15:00 - 15:18 Contributed Presentation: 

• Forward-Responsibility in Petri Nets
  by Caroline Lemke, Heike Wehrheim (Carl von Ossietzky Universität Oldenburg)

15:18 - 15:30 Open Discussion

15:30 - 16:00 Coffee Break

16:00 - 17:30 Contributed Presentations: 

• Hybridized Sabotage Logics for Causal Counterfactual Queries
  by Basak Kocaoglu (King's College London)

• A Generalized Propensity Score Estimation Methodology for Discrete and Continuous Treatments
  by Felipe Lourenço Angelim Vieira (Independent Researcher); Alessandro Leite (INSA Rouen Normandie)

• Computing Actual Causes for Neural Network Predictions under Structured Causal Inputs
  by Jannick Strobel, Muqsit Azeem, Stefan Leue (University of Konstanz)

• Rethinking Counterfactuals: Hidden Assumptions and Practical Pitfalls
  by Gerrit Grossmann, Yahya Aalaila, David A. Selby, Sumantrak Mukherjee, Sebastian Vollmer, Jonas Wahl (DFKI)

• Has Practice Already Crossed the Causal Barrier? Causality, Formal Models, and Contemporary Machine Learning
  by Dragan Bosnacki (Eindhoven University of Technology)

Evening Program: FLoC Workshop Dinner

Venue: CREST'26 will be held as a one-day workshop on July 24 at ISCTE, the FLoC'26 venue in Lisbon, Portugal. 

Organization

Steering Committee