Centre for Social Sciences in H2020 and Horizon Europe
Established in 2012, the Centre for Social Sciences (CSS), a Centre of Excellence of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, is currently a partner in nine EU-funded projects within the frameworks of both Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe. This amounts to over €1.3 million in funding for excellent and innovative research.
Learn more about our EU funded projects:
CSS is part of the Eötvös Loránd Research Network, an independent public institution managed by a 13-member Governing Board and accountable to the Hungarian Parliament. CSS is classified as a public budgetary institution, making it eligible not only to submit proposals to any EU funding programme but also to participate in EU-funded projects as a coordinator, partner, or sole beneficiary.
Featured news
Assya Kavrakova: Without Citizens' perspectives, We Won't Understand Populism
Populism has been widely studied by academia. Yet, studies haven’t ascertained how citizens react to populism, nor how populism affects them. Check out interview with European Citizen Action Service (ECAS) executive director Assya Kavrakova and find out how DEMOS's action research fills that gap and how it will try to detect populist fakenews.
Horizontal and Vertical Populism: The case of UKIP and Brexit
UKIP employed a fusion-strategy, which merged their traditional critique of Europe with a critique of immigration, as a way of overcoming the low electoral salience of the EU
Jennifer McCoy: Populist Message of ‘We’ Versus ‘They’ Dehumanizes the Other Side
Populism is not always bad, but a populist political message can divide societies between “us” and “them”, explains Jennifer McCoy, a distinguished professor of political science at Georgia State University and a senior core fellow of the Institute for Advanced Study at Central European University. In a new episode of DEMOS interviews on YouTube, McCoy discusses the main features and negative consequences of populism for democracy, like a deep political polarization, and how society can detect and react to them.
Award for the best presentation at Conference for Doctoral Students of Political Science
The Institute for Political Science of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences intends to honour the best English or Hungarian presentation at Conference for Doctoral Students of Political Science organized by Institute for Political Science CUB.
David Wineroither Writes Op-Ed for Austrian Der Standard on British Tory Brexiteers
Political scientist David M. Wineroither, DEMOS researcher at the Centre for Social Sciences of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, wrote an op-ed for the Austrian national daily Der Standard. In his piece, Wineroither summarizes the structural inability for collective leadership on behalf of British Tory Brexiteers—a feature to characterize both the political ascendancy of Boris Johnson and populists in the majority of countries on the continent
Trump is not that much of a populist - Levente Littvay on Collaboration with the Guardian and Populism
DEMOS interviews Levente Littvay, Professor of Political Science, Central European University (CEU) and member of the Team Populism on collaboration between academics and the Guardian, which has published a series of evidence-based articles on populism. Littvay also spoke about his research on populism, populist discourse, and the CEU Comparative Populism Project
Csaba Győry wins 2019/20 re:constitution fellowship
DEMOS Expert Says Abuse of Referenda is Typical of Populist Parties
Jose Maria Castellà, professor at the University of Barcelona and leader of the Spanish team in DEMOS, said that the use and abuse of referenda on any subject in contemporary democracies are typical of populist parties. “These parties tend to claim that institutions of representative democracy are not representing the so called true people, and present their political action as a direct enactment of people’s will,” Castella, also a member of the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe, told “Expansión”, Spain’s leading business newspaper. The interview, on the rise and impacts of populist politics in Europe, came out on the eve of Spain’s elections.
DEMOS project leader Zsolt Boda interviews Andrew Arato (VIDEO)
DEMOS project leader Zsolt Boda interviews Andrew Arato on the impacts of populism on democratic life and its relationship with authoritarianism and well-fare state.
Our results
Illiberal Social Policy in Europe. New paper by Dorottya Szikra
9 July, 2025
Szikra, D., & Autischer, L. (2025). Illiberal Social Policy in Europe: When Policy Implementation Meets Welfare Ideas. Politics and Governance, 13, Article 9707. https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.9707
Urban Planning in the Context of Democratic Backsliding
Recently published (17.06.2025):
Kőszeghy Lea, Hilbert Bálint, & Csizmady Adrienne (2025). Urban Planning in the Context of Democratic Backsliding: The Case of Hungary. Urban Planning, Vol 10 (2025): The Role of Planning in ’Anti-Democratic’ Times. Urban Planning, Cogitatio Press. 0.592 (Q1), IF 1.7 (2024)
New book: The Challenges of Artificial Intelligence for Law in Europe
13 May, 2025
The book The Challenges of Artificial Intelligence for Law in Europe published recently by Springer was edited by Márton Varju and Kitti Mezei, as part of the book series Data Science, Machine Intelligence, and Law.
Measuring attitudes towards voluntary childlessness: Indicators in European comparative surveys
20 March, 2025
New publication:
Szalma I, Heers M, Tanturri ML (2025) Measuring attitudes towards voluntary childlessness: Indicators in European comparative surveys. PLOS ONE 20(3): e0319081. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0319081
Mental health risk in human services work across Europe: the predictive role of employment in various sectors
New publication: Ágnes Győri, Éva Perpék, Szilvia Ádám: Mental health risk in human services work across Europe: the predictive role of employment in various sectors. Frontiers in Public Health-ben (Q1, IF: 3)
30 January, 2025
WISE project and OTKA research: Collective for women for solidarity in energy and the energy crisis in Hungary
4 November, 2024
Transport poverty in Hungary
Expert workshop on 9 October, 2024
Long-term impact of unhealthy food tax on consumption and the drivers behind: A longitudinal study in Hungary
Importance of social inequalities to contact patterns, vaccine uptake, and epidemic dynamics
Manna, A., Koltai, J. & Karsai, M. Importance of social inequalities to contact patterns, vaccine uptake, and epidemic dynamics. Nature Communication 15, 4137 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-48332-y