Wie kann zivilgesellschaftliches Engagement gegen Rechtsextremismus wirksamer unterstützt werden? Wer übernimmt welche Verantwortung in Politik, Wissenschaft und Zivilgesellschaft? Und wie lassen sich Praxiswissen und wissenschaftliche Evidenz besser miteinander verzahnen, damit vernetztes Handeln Wirkung entfaltet?
How have dramatically falling birthrates driven Putin’s War in Ukraine? What role do they play in today’s anti-immigrant populism in Europe and in the United States? How do they shape the conflicts around identity politics? These will be the central questions in an event organized by WZB Berlin Social Science Center in cooperation with the American Academy in Berlin on April 14, 2026.
Can intergroup contact improve relations between refugees and host communities? If so, are there added returns to combining contact and empathy education? To answer these questions, we conducted a field experiment that brings together 900 Syrian refugees and Lebanese nationals in three localities in Lebanon, where refugees make up a quarter of the national population. Working with a Lebanese NGO, we randomly assigned Lebanese and Syrian youth participants to nationally heterogeneous (Lebanese and Syrian) or homogeneous (Lebanese or Syrian) groups for a 12-week psychosocial support program.
This workshop is co-organized with Prof. Franziska Keller (University of Bern). If you are interested, please apply through the link.
Contemporary conservatism is undergoing significant strain in many countries. It faces pressure from a growing radical right, internal radicalization tendencies, and the normalization of formerly fringe positions. Long-standing conservative policy priorities of low taxation and public spending are challenged by overlapping economic and demographic crises. At the same time, there are signs of backlash among conservative voters against progressive value change and identity politics. These pressures occur in political landscapes shaped by growing polarization, hostility, and fragmentation.
Equal access to justice is a central prerequisite for democratic societies. Yet the gap between legal ideals and lived reality remains wide. Legal aid systems face growing pressure, digitalisation creates both new opportunities and new barriers, and social inequalities continue to shape how people understand and use the law. In times of increasing social and economic polarisation, questions of equitable access to justice become ever more pressing.
How can democracies respond to crises without sliding into technocracy or political erosion? Celebrating the recent publication of Democracy on a Tightrope: Politics and Bureaucracy in Brazil, this event brings the authors into conversation with academics and civil society, highlighting both the challenges and the productive forms of collaboration that shape democratic governance today
Authors:
Pedro Abramovay (Open Society Foundation)
This lecture will present a study by Anna Baranowska-Rataj and Sara Kalucza (Umeå University) about the influence of adult children's adverse labour market experiences on the mental health of their ageing parents. Taking a life course perspective, this study examined the trajectory of adult children over nearly a decade following graduation from a school or university.
