The V-Dem Regional Center for Southern Europe was founded in March 2016. It aims to develop research on the causes and consequences of democratization in Southern Europe, which includes the countries of Andorra, France, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Spain, and Cyprus. The Center is supported by a Research Grant awarded to Tiago Fernandes and Staffan Lindberg, by the Francisco Manuel dos Santos Foundation (Lisbon, Portugal). The Center organizes several activities, namely yearly academic conferences and policy-oriented workshops.

Since May 2021, V-Dem Southern Europe is also the representative of Portugal at the European Policy Institutes Network of the Centre for European Policy Studies (Brussels).

We invite scholars, policy-makers, journalists and the general public to contact us.

Research

The V-Dem Regional Center for Southern Europe conducts research on the causes and consequences of democracy and democratization in the region, using the Varieties of Democracy dataset, and combining it with historical research. Until 2024 the center will pursue the following research projects:

• The origins of liberal democracy and the rule of law in Portugal from the 1970s to the present within a comparative framework of third wave democratization;
• A comparative study of patterns of democratic quality in France, Greece, Italy, Spain, and Portugal since the late 1960s to the present; and
• The long-run consequences of democratic institutions for human welfare, economic development, and social and political trust.